Prisoner of war handmade escape compass : Lieutenant A L Walker, 2/1 Australian Machine Gun Battalion

Small handmade escape compass in a wooden container. The container originally contained Swedish Soletter Astra saccharine tablets from a Red Cross parcel. The free moving cardboard dial is marked with black ink, with the arrow to indicate north made from metal foil from chocolate wrapping. The compass is protected by a circular piece of perspex. On the lid of the container is 'SOLETTER / Ca 500st / 1 tabl. = 2 sockerbitar / 4 tabl. = 25g socker / 450 ggr sotare / an socker / ASTRA'.

Handmade escape compass made by Lieutenant A L Walker at Oflag VIIB. Archibald Larnach Walker was born at Brighton, Victoria on 12 December 1913. He was a stock and station agent and had served in the militia for six years before he enlisted into the Second AIF on 1 May 1940. He was taken on strength of the 2/1st Machine Gun Battalion (MG Bn). After training in Australia he embarked from Australia aboard the Ulyssess on 6 August 1940. He arrived at Liverpool, England on 9 October, spending a month in England before embarking for the Middle East on 16 November. He was briefly attached to 2/9 Battalion in November and December, before returning to the 2/1st MG Bn.

On 29 March Walker embarked for Greece with his battalion to support the 6th Division. A few days after arriving in Athens the 2/1st moved to Gerania in the north to support units manning the Aliakmon line. The machine gunners fought alongside the infantry for the rest of the campaign and were evacuated between the end of April and the beginning of May. Walker, however, was not evacuated and was noted as missing in action on 30 April 1941. In July he was noted as a prisoner of war, which was confirmed in September. He had been captured by the Germans during the withdrawal from Greece in April.

Walker was first held at Oflag VB prisoner of war camp at Biberach, Germany. In February 1942 he was transferred to Oflag VIB at Warburg. After a mass escape there, known as the 'Warburg wire job', all British and Commonwealth officers were transferred from Warburg. Walker was sent to Oflag VIIB at Eichstatt, Bavaria. He remained in this camp until it was evacuated in April 1945 due to the Allied advance.

When the prisoners evacuated the camp, many of the 'old timers', including Walker had accumulated many items, as they had been prisoners for many years. The German Camp Commandant, who had been a prisoner himself in the First World War made an arrangement whereby the prisoners packed up the possessions they could not take with them. The Commandant locked the possessions in a room. When the camp was liberated he agreed to let the Red Cross know about the items and give them the key. Eighteen months after Walker returned to Australia his kit bag arrived with the items he had packed away, except for his diary, which had been removed.

Meanwhile the prisoners were marched from Eichstatt to to Stalag VII A at Moosburg, where Walker was liberated, arriving in England in May 1945. He returned to Victoria in July 1945 aboard the Mauratania. He elected to remain with the AIF and served until April 1947 when he was transferred to the Australian Army Reserve. The Perspex cover of the compass was originally covered with powdered saccharine to conceal the compass, in case of searches by German guards.