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German rally

Heroes Remember

German rally

Transcript
Oh, I went to one place called the (inaudible) with Dad, that was later on. I think it was about 1938. Yeah. And Dad said, "I want you to see this." And I said, "What?" He said, "Well..." The (inaudible) was a big amphitheatre, with a, built sort of like an amphitheatre. And they were having a Nazi get together. And I never saw so many flags in my life. And, Hitler wasn't there yet, and we walked in, and we were at the top and took a look, and Dad, I had a camera, and Dad said, "No, just don't do anything." We took a look, and he said, "Now we are getting out." We walked out, and because we would have been challenged in a very short order and then we would have been in trouble because we're not Nazis. But it was amazing, brown shirts as far as you could see, a row of German eagles up on a post, just like Rome, it just looked like Rome. And I was quite impressed with it, and they were absolutely mesmerized. And Hitler often said when you are talking to a crowd, it's like talking to a woman. And I'm not anti-woman, but that's what he said. And he said a crowd acts like a woman, they're hysterical, and they are easy to sway. An individual man and an individual woman don't act that way normally, but in a crowd, he said, that's what he said. And I know the women's libbers will hate to hear that, but that's exactly what it was like. And they, they, you couldn't believe it, if he told them, well if he told them to hit their neighbour, they'd have done it. Nobody believed it. You know my father wrote a letter describing, every time we went over for something, he had wrote a letter to Ottawa and one to England, and Ottawa called him a war-monger and the Brits said, "We're trying to make peace." That's under Chamberlain. And so they didn't want to upset the nest. So, they paid no attention. They may have paid attention, they probably did, but they certainly wouldn't do it publicly. They did do something, because it did increase the air force strength, but it was pukey.
Description

Mr. Weir describes visiting a Nazi rally and the way in which Hitler commanded a crowd. He also described the way in which Ottawa and Britain were hesitant to acknowledge what was taking place.

John Weir

Mr. Weir was born in Toronto on July 22, 1919. His father was DSO MC in the First World War, a colonel. He was machine gunner in the 19th Battalion, and was gassed at Vimy and suffered from then on with asthma. After seeing the horrific pictures of the trench warfare from his father's service, Mr. Weir decided to join the Air Force rather than serve in the trenches. He joined the service the day after war was declared and began his training in Winnipeg. He started off as a pilot officer-provisional but wanted to be a fighter pilot. During his service, Mr. Weir was shot down in Barth and captured. He was a prisoner in a Gestapo jail, and was involved in "The Great Escape from Stalag Luft III". He was moved to various prison camps and witnessed atrocities of the Holocaust. He eventually escaped on a forced-march from Bremerhaven to Lübbecke by bribing a German guard.

Meta Data
Medium:
Video
Owner:
Veterans Affairs Canada
Duration:
02:41
Person Interviewed:
John Weir
War, Conflict or Mission:
Second World War
Location/Theatre:
Europe
Battle/Campaign:
Battle of Britain
Branch:
Air Force
Units/Ship:
401 Squadron
Occupation:
Pilot

Copyright / Permission to Reproduce

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