Eye on Millig: Former Shandon PoW heading back to Normandy

Paul Golz, who was captured near Utah Beach in June 1944, remembers working on roads and playing football in the snow during his time as a prisoner at Stuckenduff Camp at Shandon after World War Two.

Eye on Millig first told his story on March 6, 2014, and an article by Paul about his experiences — translated from German by his friend, Dr Andrew R. Denison — was uploaded soon after to the Helensburgh Heritage Trust website.

Now 91, Paul lives in the town of Königswinter, a city and summer resort on the right bank of the Rhine in the Rhein-Sieg district, in North Rhine-Westphalia, opposite Bad Godesberg and south of Bonn.

He previously visited Normandy in 2014 to attend the 70th anniversary commemorations, and a video of that trip can be seen at www.youtube.com/watch?v=30Op5vkuZbc.

He is still very keen to make contact with Helensburgh woman May Shields or her family, who befriended him, or at least to find out how they are now.

Paul's initial imprisonment was in America, but in May 1946 all PoWs in the States were released. He and other prisoners thought they were going home, but instead found themselves on route to Helensburgh.

Of his time on Garelochside he recalls: “First, we refused to work, but that did not change anything. We took the train every morning past Loch Lomond.

“As of January 1947 we were able to move quite freely. We could go into the town of Helensburgh and could also use the double-decker bus.

“For this we needed real money. So I went after work from about 5pm in the town and did gardening work.

“In February it was snowing in Scotland despite the Gulf Stream, so much that the train could not travel and we had to stay at the camp — so we had plenty of time.

“The Scots are known to like playing football. The football coach came to the camp and asked us if we could clear the football field from the snow for the match on Saturday, so 20 of us did.

“Finally, I grabbed the broom and cleared the remaining snow in front of goal. This must have pleased the coach, because he invited a colleague and me to come to his house for lunch on a Sunday.

“Now you have to know that meat in Scotland at the time was still rationed and they had to share the meat with us.

“Through this invitation, I was invited every Sunday and they told me that my home was annexed by Poland, so I should stay in Scotland and work in agriculture.

“I told them I first wanted to return Germany and find my family, from whom I had no sign of life.”

The football coach was Helensburgh man Jack Shields, and Paul met his family and went on a date with May Shields.

He tells me: “May invited me to a concert or a walk, although I had PW written on my trousers.

“I remember going on a date with her, attending an afternoon dance event where the guys sat on one side, and the girls on the other.

“May was two years younger than me and had a brother Dennis. I think she and I had our birthdays the same day, April 4.”

Paul speaks of taking the Inverness train and working on building roads in the mountains — probably, like other PoWs, at the Loch Sloy Hydro Electric Scheme — before he returned to Germany in October 1947.

He went to Hamburg and at first lived with his uncle in Hamburg-Altona. From there he travelled to the Rhineland to join his brother.

Paul served in the German border police from 1948 until 1958, when he joined the German diplomatic service in which he served until his retirement in 1990.

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This is Paul's story of how he came to be a prisoner of war...

I will begin in December 1943 in Thorn, West Prussia, when my military training ended.

The cold weather in Thorn left me with diphtheria and scarlet fever. Thus I did not go to Russia in January 1944, as my comrades in the company had, and where the first of them had already fallen. Already then my guardian angel had saved me from Russia.

When my illness passed, it was March 1944. After sick leave of one month I was transferred to Baumholder, where the new Rommel division was being formed.

I was assigned to an SMG — heavy machine gun — group as a ‘Schütze 4’, who had to carry the ammunition boxes.

Our unit moved to St Nazaire in France, and it was thought at first that the Allies would land there.

Presumably, information got out that this would not happen, so our unit was moved into Normandy with our Panjekärchen, carts with two wheels on which a big gun was loaded.

In about mid-May, we had dug ourselves in with tents on the heights. In the following weeks, with the French, we set up so-called ‘Rommel asparagus’ in the swamp.

These are about four-metre long logs buried in the earth and then connected with barbed wire.

On D-Day, at about 2pm, I was standing guard and saw the Allied planes drop so-called Christmas trees, which were beautiful to look at. That was roughly in the area of Carentan.

In the morning I got myself a litre of milk in the village. The French said to me: “Get out, the Allies have landed.”

Our unit was then moved toward Carentan, where the parachute troops had landed. At our first stop, we saw then the first gliders and parachutes in nearby fields. We had not had food or water for about two days.

Looking for chocolate or anything edible in the fields, which are separated in Normandy by thorn hedges and ditches, I saw something white that moved.

I went to it and saw that a black-faced paratrooper had put a white sock on his gun. I cocked my gun and walked toward him. He was trembling with fright all over.

Since I did not speak English, I said to him: “Ich tue dir nichts (I won’t harm you).” Because of my calm tone, he realised that nothing would happen to him.

Finally, he offered me his canteen with the words: “Good Water”. For safety reasons, I let him drink first and then drank too — after days of no water.

I had taken his sharp parachuting knife that he wore on his legs. He was then transported to the prisoner holding area.

The following day we were assigned to search for hidden paratroopers. With me was a Saxon comrade. There I also discovered my first corpse, a white American paratrooper.

He was on an embankment, eyes open. I looked at him but saw no wound or injury. My colleague searched him, and took a leather case that contained an image of a blond woman from New York.

I said to him: “Leave that with him.” He said to me: “I like it.”

Since the dead American was already stiff, he wanted to pull a gold signet ring from his finger, but it did not work.

Because he wanted to cut off the finger with his bayonet, I said to him: “If you cut off his finger, I’ll blow you away.” He became scared and backed off.

A few days earlier American troops had already landed with ground forces such as tanks. We were supposed to cover the withdrawal of the company with our SMG group, an officer and us four men.

A tank stood in front of the entrance to the field. The accompanying soldiers came into the paddock and shouted: “Komm an Boy, Hands up”.

We were taken to the prisoners' centre and were searched. They discovered the American’s photo with my Saxon comrade.

I said to him: “You should have left that with the dead man.”

A guard struck him on the back with the butt of his rifle.

I said to him, “See, that’s what you get. If they had found the ring with you, they would have killed you right then and there.”

We marched to the coast and were transported to an English ship on landing craft. That evening I ate my first meal in three days.

During the fighting I probably had a good guardian angel; merely a piece of shrapnel had torn a hole in my uniform. By boat we went to England, and then by train to Scotland.

After about two weeks in a camp with Nissen barracks we were loaded on a ship, the Queen Mary One, a troop carrier which took 2,000 German prisoners of war to America.

Because of the submarine threat they made the voyage known before hand, so that the submarines would not attack.

After about five days we reached New York, and were taken from there to Camp Patrick Henry in West Virginia by Pullman car.

Soldiers who had served in the Africa Corps greeted us, and in the camp canteen I drank my first Coca Cola.

In the American military kitchens, the prisoners served the Americans their food, but we received the same catering as the soldiers.

Once a month we were allowed to write a letter to a German family — and the German authorities blacked out the fact that we had chocolate.

I was there until the voyage back to Scotland in May 1946 and imprisonment at the Shandon camp.

email: milligeye@btinternet.com