Dieppe Artifact 7: Prison Camps

  This is a photograph of Canadian soldiers being held at gunpoint outside the Dieppe hospital after they were captured on the beach. Canadians were held in captivity in the town of Dieppe for days after the raid while German soldiers rounded up and remaining troops and waited for transport to arrive that would take most Canadian soldiers to the Stalag 8B camp in Lamsdorf.

  One of these captured soldier whom is pictured above was Staff Sergeant R.E. Crumb. Crumb provided the Canadian Legion with a collection of photographs and stories about his time with the Canadian military and how he survived the Dieppe landing and then imprisonment. (link below)

  The Canadian soldiers such as Crumb captured during the Dieppe Raid faced horrible living conditions in German prisoner-of-war camps. Initially, many endured gruelling marches to holding facilities, followed by interrogation sessions aimed at extracting intelligence. Once in POW camps, the soldiers were subject to strict routines, limited freedoms, and underwhelming provisions. These Canadian troops captured in 1942 were held in POW camps until 1945 when Allied forces began their final march into Germany.

References

Adams, Sharon. “Prisoners of Dieppe.” Legion Magazine, August 18, 2021. https://legionmagazine.com/prisoners-of-dieppe/.