John Houseman's Diary - Mission EUCALYPTUS (part 7 of 7)

13th August:

A hot bath. Bliss. Breakfast in a cafe and up to the Police station at 8 am. Here we waiting until 11 am doing nothing. The Colonel appeared and was told about us, and that we wanted to see a representative of our Legation without delay. The next thing that happened, we were on our way to the Quarantine Camp at Bad Lostorf.

The Swiss were evidently terrified that we might have some important news to impart, and, although even if we had information it seemed obvious it could have done no other than to help them if only indirectly - but the question of neutrality came first. And Bad Lostorf for three weeks it was; and there was no chance of reporting ourselves to the Legation.

The Swiss corporal who escorted us to Bad Lostorf was a pleasant young man, spoke English quite well and seemed reasonably pro-English. During the journey, having discovered he came from Berne, we asked him if he would deliver a message to a cousin of Desmond's who held a position in the Embassy and he agreed. We did not seriously expect it to reach him, but, clearly, it did. A week or so later I saw a small party of bicyclists riding round the yard of the compound and one of them was calling out Desmond's name. He, Desmond, went down at once with a hurriedly scribbled message, walked across the yard among the cyclists one of whom conveniently fell off at his feet. As he helped him to get disentangled from the bicycle he was able to slip the message into his pocket. It reached London within a short time.

We were increasingly anxious to return to France and to rejoin one of the Maquis groups nearby. We kept up a stream of applications and eventually, after the three week period, received our clearance to go. On arrival at Berne we heard that permission had been cancelled but, thanks to a fast taxi driver, managed to reach the frontier at Martinique with five minutes to spare. Not until that moment did we discover that the Southern Invasion had overtaken the area and that we were now behind our own lines.

Notes at end of Diary:

'PETER' BULL. helped to escape, while serving as a German soldier the following: Whitney Smith, 211, Lansdowne Avenue, Wayne Samuel Carlick, PADUSAH, Penno Kentucky B.O.R.S. from Marines Commando from Bristol also American officers: "Russian Soldier with moustache who took the above from Div H.Q. during bombardment at Litry. Entered Swiss 7 Aug. Escaped 10th July. Will be at M. EMILE MOSON, La Valdahon DOUBS. Nr Bousancon

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.