07-05-2025
Man, 94, shares his memories of German Occupation of Guernsey
'We were starving but you had to live with it'
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Robert Hall
BBC News, Channel Islands
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Louis Ogier, 94, was nine when he crouched behind a wall with his mother and father as German bombers attacked Guernsey
"When it all ended, what a pleasure it was that you could be free."
A man from Guernsey has shared his experiences of the German Occupation of the island the 1940s.
Louis Ogier, 94, was nine when he said he remembered crouching behind a wall with his mother and father as German bombers attacked the island.
The Germans invaded the Channel Islands in June 1940 and were the only British territories to be occupied during World War Two.
As a child, Mr Ogier lived in St Sampson and went to Catel School.
On one occasion he said he remembered narrowly missing some small German practice shells.
"We tried to heat them up in an old saucepan," he said.
"Nothing seemed to happen - then bang!
"My friend Edgar got two pieces of shrapnel in his leg.
"We pulled them out with a pair of pliers, and put cobwebs on the wounds because someone said it might help."
Relief on both sides
Another memory Mr Ogier recalled was when he broke his father's house rules and listened to music on a secret radio set hidden behind window curtains.
"Five or six Germans came knocking on the window, and wanted to listen themselves," he said.
"They were dancing away until their officer turned up. They never split on me, and my father never found out."
The 94-year-old said generally "we got along with them all right" and would "give us a telling off but no more than that".
When Liberation came, he said the Germans were relieved, and ready to go home.
"They were starving, like many of us," he said.
"But you just had to live with it, and when it all ended what a pleasure it was that you could be free."
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