My Word of Honour When I heard my Aul-lad use the saying I give you my word of Honour I knew he meant business and was telling the truth, he didnt use it often, but when he did, it would mean something serious had cropped up and he meant what he said, it was never a lightly used term in our house, in fact I recall him uttering those words one night to a person who didnt take it at face value and himself and the person fell out for many many years. That memory came to mind when I seen this document from the Curragh internment camp during World war 2. There were many German airmen and some Sailors interned in the Curragh during what was known in the Republic as The Emeregency. There were also a few spies who had been caught and sentenced to various terms of imprisonment ending up in the K-lines as the internment camps of the Curragh were known. In the Curragh there were also camps built for the Allies who found themselves on the wrong side of the Irish sea and a separate camp for the IRA men who Dev had rounded up and Interned. The regime in the Camps for the opposing sides in WW2 in the very early years of the war was strict enough,but after a visit by a senior German diplomat in Ireland in 1940 things gradually became more relaxed, the officers received an allowance of £3 per week, other ranks £2..the bill picked up by the German govt. Prisoners were asked to sign a bond and give their Word of Honour they would return at a given time, and this bond was good enough to see them released in civilian clothes to nearby towns for a few hours each afternoon, after a while the rules were further relaxed and they got to have 2 evenings a week out. Some rules were put in place before their few hours of freedom, they werent allowed enter pubs or hotels, they wernt allowed mix with locals or enter private dwellings. The Govt was aware that the Germans would have problems getting back to German occupied Europe, unlike Allied prisoners who would only have to make it north of the border.. There was in fact a system in place to help any Allied prisoner who decided he didnt fancy sitting out the war in the Curragh of Kildare, a group called the Escape Club was organised by a Irish based ex British officer to support any Allied prisoner making a run for it, some of these were airmen who made the error of landing in the Republic thinking they were on British soil, others who had planes damaged in dog-fights over the English Chanel during the Battle of Britain. The Photos are of a group of German Airmen and Sailors A Word of Honour form And a wreck of a German Heinkel shot down by Hurricanes from a Polish squadron, it crash landed in Co Waterford.
Posted on: Sun, 30 Mar 2014 22:20:05 +0000
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