Kiwi Kriegie

One sticky bit was when I was taken, to confront a Frenchman they were also holding in the jail. Their aim was for me to identify him as one who had helped me. In truth he had been to visit me a couple of times in the farm house and once brought in some chops for us to eat. Probably black market. He had had some contact with the Brits in the first world war and spoke a little halting English.

 I was brought face to face with him and asked if I had met him. I said no I had not met him, that I did not know his name. I knew that I wouldn't get away with this line. Luckily the man seemed to be holding his cool very well. So when the inevitable next questions came,

'Have you ever seen this man? has he helped you at any time?'

I tried to appear to crumple a bit and reluctantly admitted that he might have helped me I couldn't be sure.

'When, where and how did he help you?'

'I cant be sure but he could be the man who was ploughing in the field, and who gave me the jacket and cap'.

I had to pray that the man had a reasonable alibi for two months ago and had not been visiting Brittany!

This seemed to work O.K. as I heard a few days later that he had been released. He actually sent me per medium of the French lad a big chunk of a heavy type of cake that he had had with him in the jail. He obviously took a bit of a risk doing this and I can only think that it was in recognition of the strategy that worked.

~~~

Finally the day came, about the beginning of February I think when the French lad informed that I was going off to Germany, he thought probably 'today'.

 Sure enough at about three in the afternoon a Leutenant and a Feldwebel from the Luftwaffe turned up at the jail and after the usual administrative carry on of signing papers etc. took me to board the train to Paris on the start of a trek through to Frankfurt am Main.

Galbraith Hyde

Timothy Hyde

E book Available Soon

I've had many requests and questions
about making the whole manuscript available now as an E-book.

People who can't wait for three years to read it page by page in Real Time.

Obviously, you have only been reading extracts.
The full manuscript contains much more
and starts from the day war is declared. It includes flight training,
the trip to Canada then England for conversion to Bombers,
life in war time England, the quirks of flying a Stirling ,
Bomber Operations over Europe including flights over the Alps,
the full story of the crash flight,
and of course all the adventures listed on the home page.

We are in the middle of preparing the manuscript for distribution.
If you are interested in obtaining a copy
as a Acrobat PDF file (requires the free Acrobat Reader to open)
please send me an email and I will let you know when it is ready.

Click here to send Email

There will be a small charge for each copy
but this will be kept as a minimal figure as we want as many people
as possible to read the story.

If you do register your interest by emailing
there is no obligation to buy when it is released
but you will be offered a special pre-publication price.

Timothy Hyde