Tom Firth - Prisoner of the Gestapo: A Memoir of Survival and Captivity in Wartime Poland

First published in Great Britain in 2010 by
Pen & Sword Military
an imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd
47 Church Street
Barnsley
South Yorkshire
S70 2AS

Copyright Tom Firth 2010

ISBN 978-1-84884-206-9

eISBN 9781844684830

The right of Tom Firth to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the Publisher in writing.

Typeset in 11pt Ehrhardt by
Mac Style, Beverley, E. Yorkshire

Printed and bound in the UK by CPI

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Dedication

I would like to dedicate this book to the memory of the steadfast and staunch Polish people, many friends and especially those who so selflessly risked freedom and life, sheltering British prisoners of war. I feel this has been a much overlooked area and trust this book does in some measure remedy this.

Contents

At home in Warsaw, June 1939. George and I with our parents.

Warsaw with Father, 1936. Taken by a street photographer.

Brother George with the Intelligence Corps, Brussels, September 1944.

Rowing on the Vistula, 1938.

Albertyn Village, September 1939. Policemen shooting at low-flying Dornier bombers.

A highway teeming with refugees and Russian tanks, September 1939.

Accosted by a couple of thugs. We pitied the poor policeman who happened to be there.

In the darkness we ran straight into a hostile crowd of Communists.

New Years Day, 1940. Jurek and I being led by armed militiamen.

Our two guardians, en route to Krakow in the back of a lorry.

A beating at the hands of the Gestapo, March 1942.

Being led to Cell 152 after the de-lousing.

My first interrogation at Gestapo HQ in Krakow.

A Russian plane dropping anti-personnel bombs, July 1944.

Attempting to get through to the Russian lines.

The dubious pleasure of straying in front of a rocket launcher.

Aboard a Russian DC-3. We watched the spare engine gradually penetrate the floor of the cabin.

Notice of embarkation.

End of the line at desolate Murmansk. I wave farewell to Tamara!

Convoy to Russia.

Duck!

The Swordfish slewed along the deck missing me by a hairs breadth!

Newspaper cutting, January 1945. Tom from Warsaw.

Gillian and I in Cornwall, 1993.

Acknowledgements

My thanks to my wife Gillian for her unwavering support, Lorraine Wilson for processing the manuscript, and Henry Wilson of Pen & Sword Books, who steered the book through its final stages.

Map of Poland in the 1930s.

Chapter One

Tomorrow morning you will be shot!

These mind-numbing words, barked out in German, shook me to the core as I was hustled unceremoniously into Cell 152 in Montelupich Prison.