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A trip to Guernsey reveals tales of resistance, betrayal and survival under Nazi occupation
IT WAS hard to imagine what had happened here 85 years ago, as I walked past the solidly British Lloyds Bank and down the lively pedestrianised High Street in Guernsey's capital.
Back then, on August 16, 1940, a fearsome-looking band of Nazi soldiers had passed that very spot in perfect marching step, signalling the start of five frightening years in which Adolf Hitler's stormtroopers would occupy their only piece of British soil during World War II: the Channel Islands.
Few images will have stirred the pride of Nazi Germany's dictator more than that sight, in which the invaders' column was led by a uniformed British bobby, sporting the familiar dome-shaped 'custodian' helmet of the day.
In the eyes of the wider world, it looked like the beginning of the end for Britain. Here was a major propaganda victory in which a prized piece of the British Empire jigsaw was under Hitler's control and, in his twisted vision, would soon be a launchpad for the expected overwhelming invasion of 'finished England'.
How wrong he was. England, after the 'miraculous' evacuation of 350,000 troops from Dunkirk, was far from 'finished' under the indomitable leadership of Winston Churchill, who had decided the Channel Islands could not be defended without huge cost and loss of life, so withdrew his forces and allowed civilians to leave for the mainland if they wished – and almost 25,000 did so.
But what happened to the defenceless 66,000 who stayed behind on Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, Sark and tiny Herm? Did some risk their lives to fight back against the invaders? Or simply keep their heads down? Or, the worst option, collaborate and turn traitor?
Well, I spent a week on pretty Guernsey delving into such secrets under a new World War II scheme in which tourists can relive those dark days in the shadow of the swastika.
The truth emerged on tailored trails, guided walks and exhilarating high-speed boat trips with experts, as well as in the sometimes creepy confines of preserved Nazi blockhouses and museums.
But I was also able to read through the ageing pages of personal diaries, history books and censored wartime newspapers in the fascinating Priaulx Local Studies Library.
Here were stories and images of incredible courage – like the islanders who tapped into BBC bulletins on banned radios and circulated the news (they were betrayed by a man, thought to be Irish – see story below).
But there were also traitors who took money for information, black marketeers profiting from hardship, officials who followed Nazi orders enthusiastically and, also, the reviled local women who had affairs with Nazi troops – the so-called 'Jerrybags'.
Among the 24,429 people who remained on Guernsey to face the Germans, resistance was everywhere – often in small but dangerous gestures like the 'V for Victory' signs painted on countless walls and, sometimes, in the hiding of Jews and escaped slave workers which, like many such 'offences', carried the death penalty or deportation to a concentration camp.
It is fascinating and humbling to follow their stories in the records, trails and museums and to wonder how any of us would have coped with those five years of mounting Nazi brutality and, toward the end, the grinding starvation as supplies ran out before the Germans on the islands finally surrendered on May 9, 1945 – 11 long and arduous months after the D-Day invasion of Europe the previous June.
Of course, such a trip can also be combined with enjoyment of Guernsey's sweeping beaches, renowned hiking trails, quaint pubs, classy shopping and a wide array of cuisine – like the sumptuous seafood Thermidor at the Duke of Richmond Hotel, the comfortable base I shared with my partner and photographer Sue Mountjoy, or the mighty and succulent Tomahawk steak at the trendy Slaughterhouse restaurant on St Peter Port seafront.
We also took the refreshing 20-minute ferry boat ride from St Peter Port to sweet little Herm, one of the smallest public islands in the archipelago with just 60 permanent residents, no cars or bicycles, and offering a decent pub after a brisk circular walk at one and a half miles long and half a mile wide.
With little crime, friendly natives and a pace of life that is as laid-back as that of the golden cows that slumber in the rolling meadows, Guernsey truly takes you back in time – first to its dramatic wartime history, then to today's easy-going civility and a slower pace of life that many of us still crave.
The Irishmen who fought for Hitler
A SMALL number of Irishmen fought for the Nazis during World War II, including some who were in Guernsey during the German invasion.
Among the most renowned cases is that of Leitrim-born Frank Stringer and James Brady, from Roscommon, who both ended up serving in the feared and brutal Waffen-SS until the end of the war in Berlin in 1945.
Like thousands of other Irish teenagers, they had joined the British army for the travel and the pay before the war and happened to be in prison on Guernsey, after injuring a local policeman in a drunken punch-up, when the Nazis arrived.
The pair were sent to a prisoner-of-war camp and then, like dozens of Irish captives, to the specialist Friesack centre, run by the Nazi Abwehr secret service, for pro-Nazi propaganda induction and explosives training.
Both took part in a range of high-profile operations before Germany's defeat and, despite some debate about their enthusiasm for their roles, the pair of 'accidental Nazis' received heavy prison sentences.
Another infamous Guernsey collaboration episode came a couple of years into the Nazi occupation and involved a mysterious traitor named 'Paddy'.
Historians have debated the identity of 'Paddy' and whether or not he was a visiting Irishman, but the treachery that occurred centred on the Guernsey Underground News Service (GUNS), in which a group of courageous resisters distributed as many as 300 copies of an illegal news-sheet to local homes regularly.
The information was culled from BBC bulletins at a time when the Nazis had banned radios and had given severe penalties to anyone caught with one.
I worked in the 1970s with one of the distributors, Mick Robins – a Guernsey-born news editor in Lincolnshire – who never spoke about his bravery in riding his bike round local homes to post the newsletters after nightly curfews, risking being shot, while he was still a young boy.
The GUNS team were eventually caught and sent to appalling Nazi prisons, where several died and one more succumbed soon after his release.
A survivor, though, Guernsey journalist Frank Falla returned home to write a memoir, The Silent War , in which he describes the GUNS betrayal by the mysterious 'Paddy', without naming him. The mystery remains.
Fact file
Where to stay The Duke of Richmond offers a Classic Double room from £175 per night for two guests.
