Uh-oh, it looks like your Internet Explorer is out of date.
For a better shopping experience, please upgrade now.
Barbed-Wire Blues: A Blinded Musician's Memoir of Wartime Captivity 1940-1943
192Overview
In this moving and entertaining memoir Bernard describes daily life in POW camps in Greece and Germany. He established a theatrical group and an orchestra who perform to fellow POWs and their German guards. A superb raconteur, as well as a gifted musician, the author’s anecdotes are memorably amusing. Bernard was repatriated via Sweden in late 1943.
While blinded in one eye and seriously wounded, the author was told by his New Zealand doctor, fellow POW and musician John Borrie, "When nothing else will do, music will always lift one up." Barbed Wire Blues’ inspirational, ever optimistic tone will surely have the same effect on its readers.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781526783868 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Pen and Sword |
| Publication date: | 12/28/2020 |
| Pages: | 192 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.25(h) x (d) |
About the Author
Bernard joined the British Army as a bandsman and was posted to Greece. Captured at the Battle of Corinth 1940, blinded and badly wounded, he was a POW until being repatriated in 1943. He was awarded the Military Medal.
Post-war Bernard became a successful composer and musical director. His film credits included, appropriately, Adolph Hitler - My Part in his Downfall and Dad’s Army.
He married Marie in 1940 and they had two daughters. After Marie died unexpectedly in 1974, Bernard re-married. He died in West Clandon, Surrey in 1990.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 The End of the Beginning 1
Chapter 2 Tidying the Desert 4
Chapter 3 A Rotten Shot 12
Chapter 4 A Grecian Girl 15
Chapter 5 Red-Letter Days 21
Chapter 6 Blind Spot 27
Chapter 7 Thanks for the Memory 33
Chapter 8 The Father of Muddles 40
Chapter 9 Barbed-Wire Blues 44
Chapter 10 We Leave Athens 55
Chapter 11 Golf Professional, Forsooth 61
Chapter 12 This is the News 67
Chapter 13 What To Do All Day 72
Chapter 14 Camp Concert 79
Chapter 15 Christmas Past 87
Chapter 16 Ins and Outs 94
Chapter 17 DSO 100
Chapter 18 Look After Your Organ! 107
Chapter 19 More Ins and Outs 113
Chapter 20 The Dover Road 121
Chapter 21 Repatriation, November 1943 130
Chapter 22 On English Soil 135
Postscript 139
Appendix 164
Bibliography 168
Select Index 169







