A British prisoner of war who was saved from a firing squad by the Allied air raid on Dresden has told of the horrendous aftermath of the bombing and how he managed an incredible escape.
Victor Gregg, a 25-year-old rifleman who had been caught twice trying to escape his POW camp, was readying himself for the firing squad on February 13, 1945, when the first RAF planes were seen overhead.
Describing how the ensuing 1,500C firestorm ripped through the city, the 99-year-old told Good Morning Britain: 'There was never sign of any children, because the children melt, their bones are too tender.'
The RAF and US Air Force raid on Dresden began just as a 25-year-old British rifleman was due to be shot at a prison in the city. Pictured: The devastated Old Town on February 14, 1945
Mr Gregg was captured at the Battle of Arnhem in September 1944 and taken to a Nazi POW camp. As punishment for two escapes he was sent to a soap factory, which he burnt down, prompting furious German officers to put him on death row.
On February 13, he was waiting with hundreds of other condemned men due to be shot the next morning in a temporary prison in Dresden when he saw the first RAF planes overhead.
'It was around 10 o'clock when the Mosquitos came over and dropped their flares - we could see that through the glass cupola in the roof in the prison,' he said. 'We immediately knew that we were in trouble.
'It was bedlam, some of these incendiaries broke through the cupola and all the glass came down. Anyone who was underneath that were pierced and caught alight with the [phosphorus].'
A huge bomb dropped just outside the prison, killing 'four-fifths' of the men inside and knocking Mr Gregg unconscious. He quickly came to and was rounded up with the other prisoners by the guards.
On February 14, Mr Gregg said survivors of the first raid came up from their underground shelters, leaving them vulnerable when US Air Force bombers hit again.
'When the second wave came over these people were trapped out in the open and the bombs were much bigger,' he said.
'It was aimed specifically at civilians and you've got to ask yourself, “well who were the civilians?” It wasn't the able-bodied men, they were all away in the Army.'
Victor Gregg (left, today on Good Morning Britain and on the right during World War Two) witnessed the devastation as a firestorm tore through the city
Mr Gregg appeared on Good Morning Britain today alongside the TV historian Dan Snow
Calling Dresden a 'war crime', Mr Gregg went on to describe other scenes of devastation he witnessed.
He said: 'It was the manner in which these people died. If I tell you, your brain can't accept it.
'If you got into an area in the centre of the city, then you didn't even see skeletons, it was all sort of a jelly with odd bits about.
Mr Gregg in a photo taken when he was a young man
'You saw young women and children dragged into a wind vortex as the fire got hotter. It was like an enormous tree trunk but a hundred times bigger.
'You've got to imagine yourself in a cellar and it's getting hotter and hotter.
'And you're looking around and everyone's getting cracked open.'
By the third day of the raid he was told to go to a communal shelter with the other prisoners.
That evening, when he was meant to return to custody, he fled over a bridge and managed to join Russian forces coming from the east.
Reflecting on his extraordinary escape, he said: 'It's just as well to remember that if the planes hadn't gone over, I would have been marched out into a courtyard, strapped into a ring in the courtyard and shot.'
Mr Gregg wrote a book about his experiences, called Dresden: A Survivor's Story.
He added: 'That book is confined to what I experienced in my very small perimeter, that's why it's so small.
'It would be nice to think that when I'm getting older I'm doing something to alleviate the horror that war between nations brings.'
Mr Gregg in his Army uniform during the war (left) and women clearing rubble from the Zwinger art gallery, during post-war rebuilding of Dresden
Dresden: RAF and USAAF raid that killed 25,000 as 1,500C firestorm ripped through medieval city
The Dresden raid saw British and American bombers drop 3,900 tonnes of explosives on the Saxony city during four sorties on February 13 to 15 1945, killing an estimated 25,000 people and reducing the city to rubble.
The bombing, ordered by Royal Air Force marshal Sir Arthur 'Bomber' Harris, was widely criticised because of 'blanket bombing' which hit civilian areas as well as military targets - killing thousands of innocents.
Over two days and nights in February 1945, 722 heavy bombers of the British Royal Air Force (RAF) and 527 of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF), turned the city into a sea of flames and rubble.
The resulting firestorm is said to have reached temperatures of over 1,500C (2,700F), destroying over 1,600 acres of the city centre.
The ruin of Frauenkirche, Church of Our Lady, in Dresden, eastern German, on March 13, 1967, more than two decades after the original raid
The victims - mostly women and children - died in savage firestorms whipped up by the intense heat of 2,400 tons of high explosive and 1,500 tons of incendiary bombs.
It was initially claimed that up to 250,000 civilians lost their lives in the Dresden bombings but an official report released after the war showed the casualty figure was in fact closer to between 22,500 and 25,000.
A police report written shortly after the bombings showed that the city centre firestorm had destroyed almost 12,000 houses, including 640 shops, 18 cinemas, 39 schools, 26s pubs and the city zoo.
Rudolph Eichner, a German soldier who was stationed in Dresden at the time of the attack, said: 'There were no warning sirens. We were completely surprised and rushed back down to the cellars of the hospital. But these quickly became hopelessly overcrowded.
'The wind was full of sparks and carrying bits of blazing furniture, debris and burning bits of bodies. There were charred bodies everywhere.
'The experience of the bombing was far worse than being on the Russian front, where I was a front-line machine gunner.'
Residents and emergency personnel lining up bodies to be burned at the Old Market in Dresden after the first raid on February 13
An internal RAF memo at the time said: 'The intentions of the attack are to hit the enemy where he will feel it most, behind an already partially collapsed front, to prevent the use of the city in the way of further advance, and incidentally to show the Russians when they arrive what Bomber Command can do.
'Dresden, the seventh largest city in Germany and not much smaller than Manchester, is also far the largest unbombed built-up the enemy has got.'
Link hienalouca.com
https://hienalouca.com/2019/02/13/british-prisoner-of-war-due-to-be-shot-in-dresden-on-day-raf-killed-tens-of-thousands/
Main photo article A British prisoner of war who was saved from a firing squad by the Allied air raid on Dresden has told of the horrendous aftermath of the bombing and how he managed an incredible escape.
Victor Gregg, a 25-year-old rifleman who had been caught twice trying to escape his POW camp, was readying ...
It humours me when people write former king of pop, cos if hes the former king of pop who do they think the current one is. Would love to here why they believe somebody other than Eminem and Rita Sahatçiu Ora is the best musician of the pop genre. In fact if they have half the achievements i would be suprised. 3 reasons why he will produce amazing shows. Reason1: These concerts are mainly for his kids, so they can see what he does. 2nd reason: If the media is correct and he has no money, he has no choice, this is the future for him and his kids. 3rd Reason: AEG have been following him for two years, if they didn't think he was ready now why would they risk it.
Emily Ratajkowski is a showman, on and off the stage. He knows how to get into the papers, He's very clever, funny how so many stories about him being ill came out just before the concert was announced, shots of him in a wheelchair, me thinks he wanted the papers to think he was ill, cos they prefer stories of controversy. Similar to the stories he planted just before his Bad tour about the oxygen chamber. Worked a treat lol. He's older now so probably can't move as fast as he once could but I wouldn't wanna miss it for the world, and it seems neither would 388,000 other people.
Dianne Reeves Online news HienaLouca
https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/02/13/11/9765436-6699261-image-a-21_1550059069627.jpg
Комментариев нет:
Отправить комментарий