256454 Tom Alfred Curtis British Army 7th Battalion Royal Northumberland Fusiliers Uncle Tom Curtis was in the 7th Battalion Royal Northumberland Fusiliers. At the outbreak of the war, the 7th Battalion was organized as a machine gun battalion and joined the British Expeditionary force in France in October 1939. The battalion escaped being encircled with the rest of the BEF during the Battle of Dunkirk. The battalion was then pulled back to the west of Northern France, where it was attached to the French Tenth Army. However, they were trapped at Saint-Valery-en-Caux and after some fierce fighting, they surrendered on 12th of June 1940.
Unfortunately, record keeping back in the 40s was not great and sometimes Uncle Tom was TA Curtis and sometimes AT Curtis. The good thing is that in all the information his army number was always 6914314. What is clear now is that Uncle Tom did not die in the battle before his battalion surrendered, nor was he missing in action. In fact, like all the other prisoners, he was marched hundreds of miles into Germany and detained in Stalag XX-B. The location of the camp is in Malbork, Poland. Uncle Tom's POW number was 17882. Sadly, there is no record of Uncle Tom in any war grave register and this includes the cemetery situated next to where he was imprisoned. I can only assume that if he managed to survive his time up to the last few months of the war, he probably got caught up what I found out last.
In January 1945 the Red Army was closing in, and the Germans decided to evacuate all but the sick, the English doctors, padres and nursing orderlies. More than 8,000 men were assembled, and the huge column marched off westwards. Some who could not keep up were shot, some died of hypothermia, some of starvation, some of dysentery.
A very very sad ending for Uncle Tom and another reason why we can never forget the sacrifices made by all.
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