Free Colditz by P. R. Reid Page A

money, maps, and frontiers.
    â€œSolitary confinement” is translated into the
Wehrmacht
regulations as
Stubenarrest
. The Geneva Convention specifies that POW officers should be treated in the “same way as German officers would be treated for an offense.
Stubenarrest
was solitary confinement for not more than thirty days in a room with the bare essentials of comfort—mattress, table, chair, bucket and water jug—on standard rations and with books, writing material and cigarettes allowed. There were about half a dozen solitary-confinement cells in the Castle precinct; they were about four yards square and each had one small, heavily barred window. There were so many offenders in Colditz that the cells nearly always housed two or three POWs instead of one—and there was a waiting list. We, the canteen tunnellers, were awarded seven days
Stubenarrest
for “being absent from … quarters and for attempting to tunnel out of the camp from the church.” The Germans had actually discovered tools and the beginnings of a tunnel in the chapel. It is not known who the tunnellers in this instance were.
    A further incident towards the end of March 1941 provoked an incipient discord within the international community. Two Frenchmen decided to attempt the same escape tried by the two Polish officers, through the window of the canteen immediately above where our tunnel was already debouching. André Boucheron and Jacques Charvet made too much noise trying to cut the window bars. A sentry overheard, approached the window, saw shadows within and raised the alarm. To add insult to injury, whilst the two Frenchmen regained their quarters without demur, the Germans, convinced that the British or the Poles, whose quarters were near the canteen, must be the culprits, obliged them to spend most of the night on parade in the freezing temperature of the courtyard while the French snored their heads off under warm blankets. The next day, or very soon thereafter, the Germans posted a sentry permanently on a beat that included the grass lawn by the canteen window! He passed the window at one-minute intervals, day and night. He often stood over the exit of the British tunnel.
    On 27 March, twenty-seven Polish officers were ordered without notice to pack and parade for transfer to another camp. Rumor had it that they were going to Fort Spitzberg. The most pertinent common factor among those who were leaving was that they were all determined escapers. Jędrzej Giertych was one of them. Padre Platt was told by the Polish kitchen officer that it was considered amongst their contingent that such an accurate discriminatory selection of men could not have been achieved without the aid of a “stool-pigeon” (an informer). (It transpired later that the Polish kitchen officer was the stool-pigeon!) This was the first information of any substance that the British received of such a likelihood. The Poles would naturally be very circumspect in telling their Allies that they were virtually certain they were infiltrated by a spy.

4
Restless Captives
    Spring 1941
    O N 9 APRIL, AS IF TO SIGNAL the opening of the “escaping season,” the British contingent was summoned to the courtyard to have fingerprints and identity photographs taken by a Berlin Gestapo expert. A preposterous number of smudged prints and grimacing photos resulted. This occurrence lends credence to the statement made by General Le Brigant in his book that the Gestapo under the personal direction of Himmler demanded and obtained some rights of surveillance and control vis-à-vis the OKW over the Colditz prisoners. He says Colditz was officially declared a
Sonderlager
for this purpose.
    On 12 April at
Appell
, the French Senior Officer notified the absence of a French officer. In order to identify him, the Germans had to check the identity cards of the whole contingent—a long, arduous process as the photos of the French were all nearly a year