The German Surrender

Heroes Remember

The German Surrender

Transcript

Well we were very, very relieved because we were on the outskirts of a town called Aurich which is a communications centre between Emden and Wilhelmshaven in Germany and there was a bridge that was blocking us, our access to the town of Aurich, and we were, we had teed up an attack to go in that day to take Aurich and when we were told the cease-fire was in effect at 8 o'clock in the morning we were pretty happy. We weren't too careless to jump out and walk around in the open but I knew everybody was, had accepted the fact, no question. Aurich was a crazy story, I guess. They moved us into Aurich and we sort of became military government for awhile, we didn't know what to do. We were getting orders, we were there for a week, ten days I guess, but an order came down. Well, first of all, Montgomery's famous order was of non-fraternization. We weren't allowed to talk to the German people at all unless we were giving them orders to do something or comply with our wishes in some way but then an order came down that we were to order the German civilians to turn in all the weapons that they might have in their homes and boy did they take us literally. They brought in, the Germans have little pistols that are tiny shotguns. They shoot small birds with them and they had a lot of shotguns, it's hunting country up there. They turned in shotguns, all kinds of guns and the order got out, bring them into the, bring all your weapons into the city hall. So then a bit of panic developed when we saw an attractive looking young woman wheeling a baby carriage up the front walk of the city hall and in the baby carriage was a 250 pound unexploded RAF bomb that had been in her garden for a couple of years. And I imagine that would have been quite a sight because this young lady, was, she was being given a wide berth, there was nobody near her. She was pushing this thing up and from every window in the sides and backs of the building the heroic 17th Hussars were bailing out.

Description

Mr. Jamieson describes his memories of the German surrender. He explains General Montgomery's famous non-fraternization order and some of the responsibilities of Canadian troops as an occupying force after the surrender.

Douglas K. Jamieson

Mr. Jamieson was the oldest of two boys in the family and was born in Toronto on April 3, 1919. At the age of sixteen he moved to Montreal. While in university Mr. Jamieson joined the Canadian Officer Training Corps. His unit was converted to a regular force unit and he was shipped overseas as part a reconnaissance unit in the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division with whom he served in England, France, Holland and Germany.

Meta Data

Medium:: Video
Owner:: Veterans Affairs Canada
Duration:: 02:42
Person Interviewed:: Douglas K. Jamieson
War, Conflict or Mission:: Second World War
Location/Theatre:: Germany
Branch:: Army
Units/Ship:: 17th Duke of York's Royal Canadian Hussars-Recce
Occupation:: Reconnaissance Officer

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Date modified:: 2019-04-03