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[Page 47]
ple are depriving themselves of food to send it over to you." "Well", I said, "could Germany send her men interned in England the same as our people send us? You have no tea, cocoa, jam, dripping, beef or biscuits," which silenced him completely.
Another time, a fine looking German woman and her little son travelled in the same compartment, she was very talkative and her son played with us and arriving at a station I had to go to another compartment in which we travelled all night.
Next morning I noticed a little boy and a woman waving to me as the train left the station. For the moment I had forgotten these fellow passengers on the train, but when it occurred to me who they were, I thought, well Germany, some of your people are beginning to realize that we British are not the swine you were led to believe. I often had children coming up to me asking for an English biscuit. While on a transport of wounded prisoners being taken to Aachen we were attached to the rear of a train taking German soldiers to the front who had been on leave. Wherever these men received food, which on three occasions while we were with them, it twice consisted of potatoes and cabbage in greasy water, a portion of bread, a small piece of sausage with most of the fat extracted, there was always a crowd of little children, men and women, who lived living near the line, who stood waiting with buckets and cans to get what was left of the vegetable soup.
I have often been asked by the guard if I could spare a little black bread for their Frau, but I could not give them what I wanted myself. Women would go from the city into the country to get potatoes from the farms and there would be such a rush for the last