[POWs marching]

Depicts a column of Prisoner of War camp inmates being marched along a fence of the compound. A German guard marches to the left of them. In the foreground is a pile of personal belongings being left behind. Gordon Henry MacFarlane, born in Sydney in 1915, was a member of the pre-war permanent army, and joined the AIF as NX26, Lieutenant, Australian Army Service Corps, in 1939. He served as quartermaster with the Australian Reinforcement Depot (6th Division) in the Middle East, but was taken prisoner by the Germans (probably on Greece) in 1941. After being held in captivity at Oflag 7B, Eichstatt, he returned to Australia in 1945. The camp, Oflag 7B, is located in Bavaria in southern Germany, just north of Munich and south of Nuremberg. The inmates at the camp were allowed to receive Red Cross packages that supplemented the rations they received from the Germans, and could participate in many sporting and training activities as well as plays to pass the time. In 1943 over 60 POWs attempted to escaped through a tunnel they had dug under the fence. All were recaptured and as a result over 70 British officers from the camp were transfered to Oflag 4C at the infamous Colditz Castle.