VE Day: Silence among Nazi hardliners at Scotland's POW camp as German surrender declared

Swastikas were ripped off the uniforms of German POWs in Scotland after Victory in Europe was declared.

While news of VE Day was greeted with widespread jubilation across Allied lands, there was only silence at the Prisoner of War camp in Scotland which housed the most dangerous grade of Nazi.

Around 4,000 men were held at high-security Cultybraggan near Comrie, the only surviving ‘black list’ POW camp, at the time of the German surrender.

They included around 2,700 Germans, including those with “black” or “CX” classification which was given to members of the SS and those fully immersed in Nazi ideology.

A news blackout was part of life at Cultybraggan but as British and Allied forces started pushing into Germany on their final and fierce assault, information began to filter through to the POWs of the impending collapse of the Third Reich.

They were told of Cologne’s fall on March 7 and the occupation of Kassel on April 2. Most of the prisoners were indifferent to news of Hitler’s death on April 30, according to Valerie Campbell, author of Camp 21 Comrie. Some Germans claimed it was a hoax.

A postcard of Cultybraggan near Comrie, dated 1955. The former POW Camp is now run by the community and is open as a heritage site. The 80th anniversary of VE Day will be marked there this weekend. PIC: Comrie Development Trust. | Comrie Development Trust

In early May, a loudspeaker relayed a German news bulletin broadcast from unoccupied land on the German and Danish border.

“The German announcer read the daily bulletin of the Wehrmacht High Command which fully confirmed the disastrous news we heard. It was clear the Third Reich had but a few more days to live,” according to an account sourced by Campbell.

“When the news bulletin was over, they dispersed silently,” she added.

A few days later, the British told the POWs once again to gather for a news bulletin. This time it was to inform them of Germany’s unconditional surrender.

“This news was met by complete indifference. Hardly a sound came from Camp 21,” Campbell wrote.

The following day, on May 9th, the theatre group set up by POWs at Cultybraggan performed its first play, a production of William Tell by Schiller.

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An aerial view of Cultybraggan taken in 1948. PIC: Comrie Development Trust. | An aerial view of Cultybraggan taken in 1948. PIC: Comrie Development Trust.

According to a diary entry of the time, which is included in Campbell’s book, the POWs ‘followed the great German playwright’s passionate appeal against tyranny and for liberty. Still fully under the shock of our country’s debacle, we followed the action on the stage in a state of excitement and inner turmoil’.

Over the next three months, a period of “discouragement and hopelessness” set in as the full horrors of the Third Reich atrocities reached the men at Comrie.

According to an account of a former prisoner, the men were “incredulous and dismayed” when the “heroic facade” of the Third Reich fell to reveal the “inferno of the concentration camps”.

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Men at Cultybraggan swore never again “would we engage ourselves for any idea, party belief or aim,” according to the account.

Rumours swept the camp that the POWs would be held for 25 years and released only once Germany had been rebuilt. The atmosphere in the camp changed, and education and cultural activities ceased. Crucially, the uniforms, identity and rank of the prisoners was stripped away and Swastika badges were “ripped from tunics”.

Campbell wrote: “Until May, they had belonged to the Wehrmacht where rank mattered and discipline remained intact.

“However, after the 8th, insignias were ripped from uniforms as were the swastikas which had remained on tunics.

“There was now little to distinguish one prisoner from another and all were dejected. Even their status changed.

“Germany as a political state no longer existed therefore the prisoners lost all their rights under the Geneva Convention. During the war they had been protected by it but now this fell to the International Committee of the Red Cross which had very limited power by comparison.”

In mid-June, the POWs were taken to the camp theatre, which had previously only been used by British guards, to watch a film. Now showing was a 20-minute reel of the British liberation of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.

A diary entry, sourced by Campbell, said: “Confronted with those unbearable images, we reacted stunned and dismayed but also [with] incredulity… it was the expression of our inability to comprehend, and accept, the inconceivable’.”

Food rations were reduced at Cultybraggan and many German prisoners believed it was linked to the guards wanting retribution for atrocities committed at concentration camps.

Campbell added: “There does seem to be some evidence to support this. What used to be 25 sacks of potatoes to be peeled dropped down to five or six the following day.

“The prisoners felt they had to accept it without complaint. The rations at Comrie were still adequate compared with overseas camps, although during a medical check-up two months later all of the men held at Camp 21 were underweight.”

Tom Hollins, of the Cultybraggan Development Trust, which now runs the preserved camp as a historic attraction and holiday accommodation, said the last Prisoner of War left Cultybraggan in 1948.

By then, many had already been relocated to Watten in Caithness, the other ‘black list’ camp. It housed some of the most hardline Nazis, including Otto Baum, one of the Third Reich’s most decorated soldiers and Max Wunsche, Hitler’s one-time personal assistant. Little trace of Watten survives today.

Mr Hollins said moving Prisoners of War out of Cultybraggan following the end of World War Two became a “massive” operation - but that many stayed behind in Scotland.

“We obviously lost a lot of young men during the war. The Prisoners of War were used to rebuild and a lot of them worked in the fields with local farmers, some were on logging sites and others were building roads and homes.

“Some of those who were trusted to go out and do the logging and on the farms, some of them stayed there during the week or they were dropped there and collected at the end of the day.

“It depended on their level of thinking. If they were trusted, they could go. If they weren’t trusted, they couldn’t go anywhere.

“A lot of them had nothing to go home to and they were so welcomed by the community.”

Events to mark the 80th anniversary of VE Day will be held at Cultybraggan on Saturday and Sunday, May 11 and 12.

-Camp 2Comrie by Valerie Campbell is available from Whittles Publishing, priced £16.99.