MANNSCHAFTSSTAMMLAGER (STALAG) LUFT 6
The Luftwaffe established Stalag Luft 6 (map 4c) on March 5, 1943, in Heydekrug (today Šilutė, Lithuania), in Air Defense District (Luftgau) I. The camp commandant was Oberst Hermann von Hoerbach.
The camp was located outside Heydekrug in a wide plain dotted with small woods in the vicinity. Though positioned much closer to the eastern front than other Stalag Luft camps, the camp was safely removed from any vital military or industrial targets. The reasonably solid construction of the compound allowed the camp to weather the brief, hot summers and the long, cold winters without undo deprivation.1 The camp had 10 large brick barracks, each with a capacity of 552 prisoners, and 12 wooden barracks, each of which held 54 prisoners, for a total capacity of 6,168 prisoners.2
Stalag Luft 6 held Royal Air Force noncommissioned officers (NCOs), transferred from Stalag Luft 1 Barth. In February 1944, American airmen were brought to the camp. Initially, the camp consisted of administrative and storage facilities (Vorlager) and two prisoner compounds. At its peak, the camp had three fenced-in compounds. A fourth enclosure was used as a sports field. Two compounds contained British prisoners of war (POWs), while the other held mostly American POWs. When the first prisoners arrived at the camp in 1943, only the first two compounds were operational.
The greatest challenge to the prisoners’ well-being instead came from the overcrowding that became increasingly problematic by mid-1944. In February, American airmen began to arrive at the camp, with regular arrivals of 30–40 men per day.3 By April, the camp ranks had risen to 4,856, with 2,788 English, 1,280 Americans, 413 Canadians, 21 Irish, 128 Australians, 16 South Africans, 107 New Zealanders, 3 Dutch, 1 Belgian, 2 Norwegians, 91 Poles, and 6 Czechs.4 The growth required the creation of the third compound and expansion in the two existing ones. Additional bunks were added to old barracks and new tents and wooden barracks were constructed to house more prisoners.5 Few adjustments were made to the sanitation facilities, however, and the situation grew more serious as the spring turned to summer and the camp swelled to 40 percent above capacity.
In the barracks, the prisoners slept on double bunk beds and were provided with tables, stools, and small cupboards. All the barracks were heated. The camp had a laundry, a chapel (which three English clergymen served), seven hospital barracks with 70 total beds, and a theater with small rooms for rehearsing. The hospital beds were frequently fully occupied, and additional sick prisoners had to stay in their regular barracks.
Relations in the camp were at times strained between the POWs and guards. Prisoners occasionally attempted to play upon tensions between the overlapping authority of the various German units stationed in the camp. Similarly, German officers attempted to influence POWs by distributing Nazi and antisemitic propaganda, targeting those POWs with German-sounding names.6
Despite overcrowding and occasional tensions with the guards, morale in the camp remained high. Prisoners held an array of classes regularly with materials provided by the YMCA. Subjects ranged from engineering and architecture to music and electricity.7 Although facilities were lacking for much of 1943, by the spring of 1944 prisoners had a regular sports field and had constructed their own performance theater. They also published their own newsletter, Barbed Wire News, which the prisoners considered excellent and essential for morale.8 An adequate food supply was ensured through Red Cross parcels. The Red Cross also supplied the prisoners with clothing, which was supplemented with additional used clothing provided by the Germans.9 [End Page 509]
In mid-July 1944, the prisoners were evacuated to Stalag Luft 4 as the Red Army approached. The camp staff was transferred to St. Wendel, Germany, where it stayed until September 1944. The first prisoners were brought to St. Wendel from Dulag Luft in Wetzlar in mid-August 1944. In total, 400–450 American NCOs were held in the camp. The treatment of the prisoners was proper, and their conditions of confinement were satisfactory. On September 5, 1944, this camp was also evacuated and the prisoners were moved to Stalag Luft 4. In November 1944, Stalag Luft 6 was redeployed to Defense District (Wehrkreis) III, where it held Soviet POWs.10 The camp was disbanded in February 1945.
SOURCES
Primary source material about Stalag Luft 6 is located in BA-MA (RW 6: 450–453); WASt Berlin (Stammtafel Stalag Luft 6); and NARA (RG 389).
Additional information about Stalag Luft 6 can be found in the following publications: G. Mattiello and W. Vogt, Deutsche Kriegsgefangenen- und Internierten-Einrichtungen 1939–1945. Handbuch und Katalog: Lagergeschichte und Lagerzensurstempel, vol. 2 (Koblenz: self-published, 1987), p. 167; and Georg Tessin, Verbände und Truppen der deutschen Wehrmacht und Waffen-SS im Zweiten Weltkrieg 1939–1945, Vol. 3: Die Landstreitkräfte 6-14 (Osnabrück: Biblio, 1967), p. 44.
NOTES
1. Report by International Red Cross (September 30, 1943), NARA II, RG 389, Box 2147A.
2. OKW/Kriegsgef. Org. (Id), Bestand an Kriegsgefangenen im Ost- u. Südostgebiet u. in Norwegen, 1942–1944, BArch B 162/18251.
3. Report by International Red Cross (April 26, 1944), NARA II, RG 389, Box 2147A.
4. Ibid.
5. Report by International Red Cross (July 31, 1944), NARA II, RG 389, Box 2147A.
6. US Military Report (ca. late 1944), NARA II, RG 389, Box 2147A.
7. Report by International Red Cross (September 30, 1943), NARA II, RG 389, Box 2147A.
8. US Military Report (ca. late 1944), NARA II, RG 389, Box 2147A.
9. Greg Hatton, “American Prisoners оf War in Germany: Stalag Luft 6. Prepared by Military Intelligence Service War Department 15 July 1944,” 392nd Bomb Group at www.b24.net/powStalag6.htm.
10. Mattiello and Vogt, Deutsche Kriegsgefangenen- und Internierten-Einrichtungen, p. 167.
