Jersey
under the Swastika!

Page 45 - Philip Frederick Le Sauteur

CHAPTER TWELVE (SECTION 6)

1944

Subsequent worse weather conditions, and maybe this distressing affair, caused the postponement of several other attempts.

There was a general alarm on the evening of October 15th. The sirens sounded at 8.30 p.m. and German troops rushed from cafés, cinemas, soldatenheims, etc., to action stations. The "all clear" went at 10.0 p.m. and rumour the following morning spoke of the Navy and the R.A.F. off the west coast in strength, but more probably it was only a try-out to test the speed of assembling the troops.

Because of the several escapes and attempts at escaping, the order allowing the use of a few stretches of beach for bathing was cancelled, end permission to go limpeting or vraicing had to be obtained in advance from the Commander of the district.

Two Dutch barge skipers and two local men got clear from Gorey on the night of October 15th, and a party of  five men and a girl, after an unccessful try the previous night, got away from Pontac in a 14-foot boat.

Thanks to a local informer, several men who were preparing a boat for the attempt at St. Saviour's were caught, whilst another party who intended using canoes were arrested at Georgetown. Yet another unlucky crowd found that their boat had disappeared when they went for it — all ready for the trip — on the night of the 15th. One of the first party to make the attempts, named Le Sueur, found a pretext to be taken to his own home under armed guard, and once there succeeded in evading them while he made a getaway. A short time after he got away to France with another party.

Intending escapees made no secret of their intentions and plans, and it was hardly surprising that some of them got found out before they had an opportunity to make the attemps.

In a further attempst to stop the wholesale evacuations, the Germans issued an order calling for all boats of any description, including canoes and beach-floats, as well as outboard motors, to be declared.

The doors of the States Buildings, and the houses of many well-known collaborators, were daubed with tarred swastikas, and a notice in the press threatened an earlier curfew if the sort of thing continues.

On the evening of October 30th, a big American plane crossed the Island several times, flying very low, and with cabin and navigation lights on, and firing verey signals. After it had made a few circuits, all the flak, heavy and light, suddenly opened up and the plane dived steeply into the sea off Bouley Bay. One member of the crew was rescued, and seven bodies were later recovered and interred in the War Cemetary. The plane was obviously in trouble before it was shot down, this being emphasised by the fact that the crew were stripped ready to swim for it.

Despite the German threat, there were many instances of tar daubing. Four youngsters were caught by the Gendarmerie while preparing to blow up the premises of arch-Germanite Robert with dynamite.

Another party got clear of the Island in two boats on November 12th, and the families reported that they had received the pre-arranged signal of their safe arrival.

Another party was not so lucky, and in the words of the EVENING POST:

"In spite of the prohibition, four Islanders again tried to leave the Island yesterday in order to avoid the common fate of the inhabitants. Their boat was driven ashore and dashed to pieces against the cliffs of the north coast. They themselves were drowned. The population will only have to put to the credit of such irresponsible persons if the Occupying Authorities are now forced to take stricter measures for the enforcement of their orders."

These intending evacuees had really only themselves to blame for what had happened to themselves, for they had stolen a boat from Gorey without knowing whether it was seaworthy or equipped with usable engine or even paddles, and they were absolutely without any experience of boating.

With things as they were then, with prospects getting worse each week, it was not surprising that many young people regarded the not-inconsiderable risks of the passage to France as a lesser evil than "sharing the common fate of the inhabitants". It is fairly certain, however, that quite a number of those who made the attempt had not arrived safely at their destination, even after getting clear of the lsland (which was the worst part of the venture). The weather since the craze started had been far from perfect, and in addition to the risks of the trip, the perils of bringing an open boat upon an unknown and exposed coast, and of being mistaken for a German landing party, were by no means trivial.

A limited number of messages were being accepted for transmission to England each month. These were presumably taken with the ordinary German mail by boat to Guernsey, and thence by plane to Germany before reaching the ordinary Red Cross channels.

Another venture into escapism was made on the night  of November 28th, and, like the previous one, could hardly have hoped to achieve success. One of the three members of the party managed to get ashore at St. Catherine's with the aid of a car inner tube, but the other two (who were brothers) unfortunately lost their lives.

The multi-coloured pom-poms had a brief but concentrated "hate" against a solitary plane, believed to be a Mosquito, which crossed the Island at roof-top height, with navigation lights on, at just about dusk on December 4th. Despite the avalanche of shells, the plane got away and shot off in a southerly direction at terrific speed.

Nearly thirty young men were arrested for being in possession of arms and ammunition. Details of this "round-up" were lacking, but the incident may have been associated with a rumour of a week or two previously that a number of German scuttlers had been apprehended for selling arms to the civilian population.

Buses were now running only on Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays — which were the usual business days in the Island — owing to the shortage of fuel for producer gas vehicles, and the majority of the civil transport lorries were taken off the road. The increasingly difficult situation brought with it the probability of a considerable increase in the already large number of robberies, and the Paid Police staff was more than doubled in an attempt to cope with the problem.

New electicity regulations gave current from 7.30 a.m. until 12.30 p.m. and from 6.0 a.m. until 11.0 p.m., less two periods of half an hour in the mornings and three periods during the evenings when it was cut off to avoid any overloading.

A sign of the times was the regular mass attacks that were made on the trees through the Island. An entire district would "declare war" on a group of trees, and make havoc with saws and axes, in complete defiance of all local and German laws, and in complete disregard of any question of ownership. With the fuel ration of wood so small, and frequently so delayed in delivery, many people were in urgent need of fuel for both cooking and heating, and they naturally acted accordingly. When the need of people is so great, honesty and ethics simply go by the board!