Diary of Herbert Huie Armstrong

Place Europe: Germany
Accession Number AWM2019.22.119
Collection number AWM2017.1030.1
Collection type Digitised Collection
Record type Item
Item count 1
Object type Diary
Physical description 49 Image/s captured
Maker Armstrong, Herbert Huie
Place made Germany
Date made 1944-1945
Conflict Second World War, 1939-1945
Copying Provisions Digital format and content protected by copyright.
Source credit to This item has been digitised with funding provided by Commonwealth Government.
Description

Diary relating to the Second World War service of NX3112 Bombardier Herbert Huie Armstrong, 2/3rd Field Regiment. Armstrong was a prisoner of war of the Germans from c. October 1942 until May 1945. In his diary entries, dated between 13 May 1944 and 10 April 1945, Armstrong records details of his life in German Stalag 357. Some of his experiences include receiving Red Cross parcels on Christmas day, seeing many Allied planes fly overhead in air raids, having furniture taken away by the German guards as retribution for the way that German prisoners of war were treated by the Allies, making plates and furniture from used tin cans, rations being cut, becoming very hungry, and hearing rumours about the war. In April 1945, as the fighting came closer to the camp, Armstrong and other prisoners of war were marched out of the camp, and his final entries record how long they walked for and the limited food that they received. Armstrong and the other prisoners from Stalag 357 were recovered after the war.