Description
Mr. Raymond described the attitude shown by an SS who was taken prisoner.
Jacques Raymond
Jacques Raymond was born in Trois-Rivières and lost his father when he was very young. He was placed in an orphanage with one of his brothers, because his mother could not take care of her seven children all by herself. At the age of 17, he returned to Trois-Rivières to work at Wabasso Cotton Mills. When war broke out, he received a letter asking him to undergo some tests in Longueuil. He started his two-month training in Valleyfield. He spent six months in Western Canada, where he learned English and continued his training. He shipped out from Halifax in early 1943 on board the Nieuw Amsterdam for Greenock, Scotland, to continue his training. He took part in the Normandy invasion with the Régiment de la Chaudière. He also participated in the battles of Carpiquet, Falaise, Caen and crossed Belgium and Holland. He even went as far as Germany. He remained in Europe for 11 months.
Transcript
SS prisoners remained arrogant.The SS were, above all, authoritarian by nature, and even when they were surrendering they gave the German salute. They often got taken down a peg or two, but they were really seasoned fighters who had been indoctrinated and they had a very nasty job. It was to push on their troops. If a guy wanted to retreat or if he looked like he wanted to retreat, they shot him. They were the elite troops, trained to push on the men. But we took some of them prisoner. They were all fine figures of men. They were what were called the elite because we knew that the Germans were a handsome class of men . . . they were the perfect image of guys; it was frightening. When we saw them on television, they showed them as propaganda; they said that a German SS was worth 10 men. These guys were better trained, they were mentally prepared by Hitler . . . and it’s with them that they built their army. That’s how the Germans became strong and, when the time was right, they tried to conquer the world. They went a bit too far . . . the war would probably have finished well before if they hadn’t had these elite troops. They were the spoiled ones. They often sent them on passes to Paris, apparently, according to the stories they told. They sent them on passes everywhere. They took care of them. But after that, they returned to the front line and their job was to push! We found it funny when we saw them. They would do their salute. I know that some of them had their faces smashed in. They were given a good thumping. A lot of them were beaten up because they were showing off. That wasn’t really smart of them. There was no need to do that. It showed how these guys never thought that the war was about to end. They even thought that, when they were prisoners, it wasn’t true. Their duty was to always tell their men that they were winning, even though they were retreating. However, in reality, they were losing because the more it went on, the more they were retreating all the time.