Officers' Capture Statements make for good reading.

 

When they returned from the war many of the officers had to make a Capture Statement regarding the circumstances of their capture by the enemy as well as make statements about the conditions in the prisoner of war camps. This was recorded within days of their return.

This would’ve been necessary to prove:

1.      1.  Blame attached to the officer in regard to their capture

2.      2.  Any follow up for war crimes committed by the enemy

All officers returning from captivity were interviewed and exonerated as appropriate.

Part of Mark Strelley Fryar’s statement is in the following screenshot.

Part of Mark Strelley Fryar's Capture Statement

 

He attempted to escape a few times.  He gives the circumstances of his initial capture and subsequent camps he was housed in.

We have been able to obtain many of these from the National Archives and it may well be useful as a sort of memoir for your relative whether they were in Holzminden, Schweidnitz or other camp. Details are recorded in a time line by date and location. It often details escape attempts, routes travelled and conditions of the camps.

One other interesting report we have read is that of Lt Jocelyn Hardy. Hardy was a multiple escapee who wrote a part biographical part fictional book called “I Escape”  I read his book as I believed he may have escaped one time with Fryar. His statement runs to pages.

 

Part of the Capture Statement Lt JL Hardy 

They had to complete a standard army form explaining the circumstances of their capture. Other ranks did not have to follow the same procedure. The War Office (IIRC) vetted these forms looking for any recklessness, cowardice or neglect of duty.

Contact us if your relative was in Schweidnitz and we can help you source this document if we haven’t already.

Most times, after this statement was completed, they were exonerated by an announcement in the London Gazette which stated they were on “the exonerated officers list”. This meant the exonerated officer who had been a prisoner of war, upon being released, was found not to have contributed to his capture. Being exonerated was most likely a condition of being entitled to his campaign medals. This comment was also often evident on their medals card. 

 

Mark Strelley Fryar's Exoneration

 

WC Loder Symonds Exoneration meant he could collect his Medals 

 

Messrs COX and Co Enquiry Office

Messrs COX and Co Cheque

 One of the valuable sources of information we have used during our research is what we refer to as the “COX and Co booklet”.  COX and Co-is a collection or “List of the British Offices taken prisoner in the various theatres of war between August 1914 and November 1918‘‘. It has been  compiled from records kept by the Messrs COX and Co Enquiry Office in London. 

Cover of 1919 Messrs COX and Co List

 Messrs COX and Co were bankers and regimental agents set up in colonial times and at colonial outposts who  arranged for Officers’ pay, insurance, income tax returns and even provision of his clothing. The bank  had expanded from the staff of 180 at the onset of war to 4500 in 1918 with women replacing men called up during the war.

Their task during WWI was to issue pay and manage Officers' bank accounts. They cleared cheques for Officers departing for or returning from the front. They would often  be clearing 50,000 cheques per day.

Due to the volume of inquiries about injured soldiers in the Expeditionary Force a Messrs COX and Co Enquiry Office opened in a small room of Lord Harrington‘s house  adjoining the bank in September 1914 and expanded a few months later into the Music Room in his house until the end of the War. Between September 1914 and February 1919, the Enquiry Office was never closed to the public for a single day.

At the outset the aim was to give advice and information to relatives regarding wounded Officers. Here they  were able to collect information about Officers, especially their whereabouts and condition and also assisted in the conveyance of messages to and from wounded prisoners in hospital in France.

This task expanded when they began  collecting information about missing or Prisoner of War Officers. Often the first information of an officer being a POW and therefore alive was that his cheque was cashed. A high volume of cheques cashed by offices in captivity passed through Messrs COX and Co Bank. It is known that a volunteer from the COX and Co Enquiry Office wrote to relatives stating that “Missing Officer”  had cashed a cheque in “XYZ city” on “date” . Such a valuable use of information. What a godsend this must have been for worried families. 

Part of the Preface from Messrs COX and Co List

 After the war the information was compiled into a fantastic database with information about 8700 Officers.  It was originally  published in 1919 by Messrs COX and Co. It was completed from the records kept by the Enquiry office.  

The information recorded on each officer includes

• POW's surname, first name
• Rank
• Service Unit
• Dates reported missing  
• Dates taken prisoner of war
• Date of internment
• Date of repatriation

Some listings contained more records such as deaths in captivity.

There is no such similar record of soldiers in the expeditionary Force who were taken prisoner.

Why were the Officers cashing cheques?  Lt Eduard  W Desbarats Flying Officer from Canada wrote in his memoir about cashing cheques to buy little supplements to their food parcels from the Red Cross.

From the memoir of Lt Eduard Desbarats shared by Alexandre Desbarats

The Messrs COX and Co Bank fell on hard times due to the downturn in business after the War and was taken over by Lloyds of  London in 1923.

Captain James Bury Sterndale Bennett MC 1889 - 1941 A Journalist in a German POW Camp

 

Captain JB Sterndale Bennett

Captain JB Sterndale Bennett is another officer in Schweidnitz camp who took my attention. Born in Derby in 1889 he was the C Company Commander of the 2nd Sth Wales Borderers and was  commissioned on 26^th April 1917. He married an actress, Athene Seylar before the war in February 1914 but the marriage was short with the pair divorcing in 1922. However, they did have a daughter.  He joined up after having worked as a journalist.

JB Sterndale Bennett, film star wife Athene and daughter Jane Anne

 

After a battle where there were 101 fatalities, he was captured in Lys in April 1918, he ended up in Schweidnitz by 25 July  1918. Prior to that he had been awarded a Military Cross for his actions in February 1918.

During his time in Schweidnitz he was the BARB Magazine, Associate Editor for the October 1918 addition.  This was an in-house production of the POW magazine written and produced with humour and details of life behind the” Barbed wire”. It  contained prose,  short stories, humour, satire fake, advertisements and detailed pen and ink drawings.

Also, as a journalist, he saw the world from that  inquisitive viewpoint.  He made many observations about the German thinking and perhaps predictions about post war life.

I first came across Sterndale Bennett from an article I read  in a magazine called “The Great War…. I was there! in which he tells the tale of the  Schweidnitz POWs  from Armistice to repatriation on Christmas Day 1918. 

 

In the article he first speaks of the German thoughts at the Armistice. Most of the locals expected upon Armistice that the blockade which was stopping them trading would be raised to the Germans. To their complaints about the lack of food he pointed out their censorship had never allowed their enemies to know of their plight.

Indeed, later he recounted that point at a dinner when he returned home and a guest told him that his comments were “Nonsense. They had plenty of food.  You can’t have read the English newspaper”. Mmm propaganda!  In fact, Sterndale Bennett had had access to German newspapers which they read for practice and to relieve boredom. 

“Nonsense. They had plenty of food.  You can’t have read the English newspaper”. 

With three weeks of comparative liberty after Armistice he looked at methods of German commerce. Also,  during his time in Schweidnitz  he met with all grades of society and formed a clear idea of what the Germans at that time were thinking and hoping for the future. He could see the Germans were believing their own propaganda.

During the waiting days before Armistice and before going home Germans had said to him “We have done everything you asked”. ”We have abandoned Kaiserdom, Prussionism and militarism. Yet you treat us as enemies.  You do not send us food yet. You will not be friends again!”

From the German perspective it was “our women and children have died from starvation”.

In all, he had spent nine months in Schweidnitz. His opportunities to observe methods of German commerce and industry from his limited scope of the POW camp were supported by the ability to buy newspapers printed in German. This kept him in contact with the German hopes and thoughts. He also had contact with German  businessmen in that they ran the prison. 

 

An article by Sterndale Bennett popped up in the Casino and Kyogle Courier and North Coast Advertiser, New South Wales on 9 August 1919. No doubt this was a reprint from British newspapers.  It was titled “The German Menace of Cheap Jack Goods – Resumption of Former World Trade”. Sterndale Bennett was using his intelligence gained in his time in Germany. He dispels the fears the British subjects had that the Germans would dump cheap goods on the British market. Rather they (the Germans) had the feeling that they would merely resume trade as before the war. They did not for one minute think they would be  boycotted or stopped from visiting or immigrating to England.

“The average Englishman cannot forget. The average German has forgotten”.

In this August 1919 article he says “The average Englishman cannot forget. The average German has forgotten”.  He finishes the article saying that Germany will be  for many years repairing the damage of war and as such not really a threat for serious competition in world markets.  His main fear was that the most serious threat was Germans seeking to enter the more plentiful countries,  past enemies or not, and offer their labour cheaply.

For more on Sterndale Bennett’s story see the future Repatriation story about the Repatriation of Schweidnitz POWs.

Sterndale Bennett  was granted the rank of Captain in July 1920. He worked in London as a journalist and Editor post war. In the 1939 Register he was also listed as a part of the Army officer Emergency Response. He didn’t see the Second World War out, dying in London 1941.