Of course when I left most of these unfortunates were back in the cells, beginning their five months' stretch of solitary confinement.
Anyone looking at the map of Germany will see immediately that from the Lüneburg Heide, north of Hanover, one has to cross the following rivers before one can reach the Dutch frontier—the Aller, Leine, Weser, Hunte and Ems.
These are all fairly large. The Aller runs along the western limits of the Lüneburg Heide (Heath) and acts as a natural barrier around prison-camps situated to the east of it. When we first arrived at this camp, Schwarmstedt, the commandant had practically told us in so many words that we might get away from the camp, but that we should never cross the frontier. This meant that there was something which he knew of to be passed besides the camp guards and those at the frontier. Many of us promptly understood by his remarks that he had himself made arrangements for the guarding of the bridges over the rivers.
Another fact generally well-known to every one is this. All bridges over large important rivers are guarded in Germany, and even the railway bridges over many of the smaller ones are provided with their ancient Landsturm men.
On our arrival the commandant of our camp had spoken at once to us in English, of which he knew a certain amount. We soon got to see how proud of this knowledge he was, as he would address all the English officers on some trifling subject every second day. Besides which he would summon the senior English officer before him and all those officers who had any particular department of the camp to look after, such as kitchens, parcels, games, practically every day. The language spoken was always English.
He was a fine-looking old man, covered with medals and iron crosses, a veteran of the 1866 and 1870 wars. He loved being saluted, and complained that the British did not salute him enough. He was told that our officers do not salute when they are not wearing hats, and that many had got no military caps since theirs had been taken from them by the Germans at the time of their capture.
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He promptly ordered the canteen to get caps and sell them to us. When they arrived they were very comic to look at, dark blue with a stiff peak.