Those horses, I learnt, were a fresh supply, just received from Austria and Hungary, as the southern Allies apparently have got many more horses than soldiers to ride them.
Other very large depôts of horses, which will be ready for military service in a month or so, were at the south side of Berlin and Eisleben and Leipsig. The Government are also trying to get horses from Sweden, Denmark, and Norway, but the steps taken in this direction don't seem to have given very good results.
Germany is trying to get horses from everywhere, even at very high prices, but, like the aeroplanes, not so much for immediate use, but to have them ready for next spring. It is fully realised that cavalry at the present moment, with winter frosts and conditions prevailing, would be of hardly any use.
After a fairly long walk on the muddy road I reached Doberitz and asked for the concentration camp. I was told that it depended on whether I wanted to see the new or the old one. The new one consists of large temporary constructions, which are being erected on the manœuvring grounds on the Spandau road, and which will not be complete for some time. The old one is at the extreme west side of the town, and is really a large, lofty country house, with large green houses attached, and a chapel, formerly inhabited by Carmelite nuns, standing in a spacious garden. Only about two hundred English prisoners are kept there, but many French prisoners are quartered in another building half a mile distant. The large concentration camps are not here, but in the North of Germany. The Tommies (I don't know if there are any officers quartered with them) are made generally useful; they cut wood for the trenches, sew and prepare sacks for the same purpose, and anyone who has ability to do extra work receives a small payment for it, with which he can purchase tobacco, etc.
I asked if it was possible to talk with the prisoners, but was told that not even German people are allowed to do so, and that no permission to enter the camp was ever accorded, whatever the reasons.
I thought it would be useless, and probably dangerous, for me to try and get in, and I had to be content with walking close to the long, white wall which separates the grounds of the old convent from the main road. I heard voices talking in the purest Cockney accent, laughter, and popular English songs hummed at the other side.
At the south of Doberitz there is a small hill less than 100 ft. high, covered with thick vegetation. From its summit I managed to get a good look into the Concentration Camp.
Forty or fifty British soldiers, in khaki trousers and shirt-sleeves, were smoking and sitting about outside the main entrance of the house. It was about two o'clock in the afternoon, and they were evidently enjoying their after-dinner rest.
Two seemed to be in rather friendly conversation with one of the German soldiers who were looking after them, and another was listening to an old officer who was giving him some instructions.