Qualla: Holzminden prisoner-of-war camp

Holzminden prisoner-of-war camp: Introduction

Mon, 03 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown photographer (Life time: Unknown: active 1918), Public domain. The tunnel gave way on the thirtieth man. It was the night of 23 July 1918, and behind him in the dark stretched a waiting list eighty-six officers long, now going nowhere. Twenty-nine had already come up beyond the wire and scattered into the Lower Saxon fields. Nine months of digging under a staircase in the orderlies' quarters ended there, with a partial collapse and a queue of men filing quietly back to bed.

Image: Unknown photographer (Life time: Unknown: active 1918) | Public domain

Holzminden prisoner-of-war camp: A Barracks with the Wrong Guests

Mon, 03 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit H. G. Durnford (Life time: Unknown: active 1920), Public domain. Holzminden opened at the start of September 1917 in a cavalry barracks built only four years earlier. Two four-storey blocks — Kaserne A and B to the Germans, A House and B House to the British — held between 500 and 600 captured officers of Britain and the Empire, transferred in...

Image: H. G. Durnford (Life time: Unknown: active 1920) | Public domain

Holzminden prisoner-of-war camp: Milwaukee Bill

Mon, 03 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown: possibly C.E.B. Bernard (Life time: Unknown: active c1919), Public domain. The camps of X Corps answered to General Karl von Hänisch, who wanted them run hard. Holzminden's first commandant, the elderly Colonel Habrecht — "a kindly old dodderer of about seventy," one prisoner called him — lasted under a month before his deputy, Hauptmann Karl Niemeyer, ...

Image: Unknown: possibly C.E.B. Bernard (Life time: Unknown: active c1919) | Public domain

Holzminden prisoner-of-war camp: Parcels and Black Bread

Mon, 03 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown photographer (Life time: Unknown: active 1918), Public domain. In January 1919 the Daily Sketch called Holzminden "the worst camp in Germany." That needs the qualification the paper left out: officer prisoners across Germany lived considerably better than the other ranks, and the Allied blockade had left little food locally even for civilian...

Image: Unknown photographer (Life time: Unknown: active 1918) | Public domain

Holzminden prisoner-of-war camp: Theatre in B House

Mon, 03 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit James Whale (Life time: 1889-1957), Public domain. The enemy inside the wire was time. The prisoners answered it with football, hockey and tennis, with lectures and reading, and above all with concerts and plays. For one of them the plays mattered enormously. James Whale acted, wrote, produced and designed sets here, found the w...

Image: James Whale (Life time: 1889-1957) | Public domain

Holzminden prisoner-of-war camp: Ten Made It Home

Mon, 03 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown photographer (Life time: Unknown: active 1918), Public domain. Escaping was constant and mostly futile. Officers cut the wire, or walked out of the gates dressed as German guards, as workmen, and at least once as a woman. The first stage often worked; almost everyone was back within days. The tunnel was different because it was patient. Its...

Image: Unknown photographer (Life time: Unknown: active 1918) | Public domain