264962 Pte. Ernest William Redfearn British Army 6th Btn. Durham Light Infantry from:Woodland, Co Durham Ernest Redfearn was posted missing on the 28th of June 1942 and was reported to be in Italian hands by the 9th September. They were shipped from Benghazi to Brindisi. He was held at Campo PG70 but the initial report stated that he was at Campo PG75.
They were moved to Germany in cattle trucks and were in a marshalling yard at Verona during an American air raid.
He was at Stalag IVG, working in a quarry at a place called Rocknitz where he said there were about thirty prisoners. He seems to have spent most of the time there operating pneumatic drills in preparation for blasting. They did succeed in jamming the crusher on one occasion. The quarry produced chippings for road and also stone setts.
The German in charge was called Walter Zimmerman whose wife was also on the scene. Some of the German civilian quarrymen would trade for items out of Red Cross Parcels and the prisoners were given decorated (dyed) eggs at Easter.
The only German who seems to have been seriously disliked was the local forester. He remarked that an American air raid on Leipzig on Easter Sunday 1944 was the first sign of things going wrong for the Germans.
I believe they were released from the camp in early May and ran into American forces.
He was at Halle on VE day.
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