Great Escapes (21 page)

After the war Bruno Wright discovered that Mlle X was in fact Mathilde Carre, a British agent who later betrayed the French Resistance fighters she worked with and became an agent for the Gestapo. They used her radio and codes to set traps for British agents of the SOE (Special Operations Executive). She was eventually caught and after the war was tried in France for treason and sentenced to death. It was later commuted to life imprisonment.

The next visitor was a young Jewish girl who was to escort him to a photographer so that photographs could be taken for his forged travel and work permits. The photographer had been told he was a deaf mute so he was to say nothing the whole time he was there. The shop was full of pictures of German soldiers and sailors and gave the impression that the photographer collaborated with them. When the prints arrived later that day, a 500-franc note accompanied them from the photographer. It turned out that the girl had to disclose Wright’s identity to the man in order to get the photographs processed quickly. Having been given that information, the photographer pulled out all the stops to make it a priority and the money was to help Bruno Wright.

That evening Bruno sat down with the Massons for dinner and to listen to the radio. They listened to the French section of the BBC and heard a number of messages being passed to the Resistance. The Massons said that they hoped to hear the message that said ‘Bruno has arrived safely’, which would mean that he had got back to England. As he was about to leave for his shed, a full-scale air raid took place, as RAF bombers once again attacked the harbour at Brest. The fact that the Germans were feeling the full brunt of the attack never made it any less frightening. The children in the house were crouched in the hallway terrified and tearful and Bruno Wright’s feelings were very similar.

One of the Resistance men told him of an incident just after an RAF raid on the harbour, when another bomber, with all its navigational lights blazing, flew over the town and dropped bombs indiscriminately. The townspeople found out later that it was the Germans who had actually carried out the raid in an effort to get the Bretons to blame the British. In fact all it did was to make the Breton townspeople despise the Germans even more – if that was possible.

Wright noticed that tea appeared to be plentiful and was told that when the British had retreated, they left behind large stores of food and clothing which the people of Brest immediately ‘liberated’ rather than let
‘Le Boches’,
as they put it, get their bloodstained hands on it.

The travel and work permits arrived and preparations got under way for Wright to be moved. His clothes were scrutinised so to eliminate any indication that he was British. Even his wedding ring, which was so obviously ‘foreign’, was taken from him on the promise that after the war they would return it to him. The Dutch and Belgian money was also taken, as no Frenchman would carry currency from these countries.

Then word filtered through that the Germans were going ahead with ‘Operation Thunderbolt’, which meant that they were about to move the pocket battleships out of the harbour at Brest. An immediate clampdown on all travel in and out of the town was enforced, and anyone caught on the streets was subjected to very stringent scrutiny.

The following night a member of the Resistance came and told him he was to be moved to another safe house. Just before he left Jean-Jacques handed him a wallet with French francs in it. He told him to use the money, but asked that when he got to London he would try and see that his brother, Hérve Le Scour, who was an officer with the Free French Forces, got the wallet. Bruno Wright said he would, and true to his word, managed to get the wallet to Jean-Jacques’ brother when he returned.

The new family was Jewish and very relaxed. The apartment in which they lived was part of a billet for Germans, who lived in the apartment above. In one way the family was above suspicion, because no one would have dreamed of hiding an allied airman in such close proximity to the Germans. On the other hand if he were to be discovered, there is no doubt that the family would have been interrogated, tortured and then shot.

The father gave music lessons to children every day and was in the process of learning English, whilst the daughter, who was crippled, spoke excellent English. This of course made conversation considerably easier and instructions to Wright simple. It was during one of their conversations that Wright discovered that the family had a friend who was French-Canadian and who was working for allied intelligence in France. If they could make contact with him he might be able to help lay the groundwork for Wright to escape via one of the escape lines. This was to be the first time that Bruno Wright would hear of the famous Pat O’Leary escape line.

The following morning, he was taken for a walk to a café where he was introduced to a man called Labasse. During the walk to the café Wright found it interesting to note the number of German military personnel in the town. He was told later that it was in fact payday and the men were out for a good time, much like the boys back home Wright thought.

On entering the café he noticed that the proprietor immediately closed the bar. Labasse told him that they were leaving Brest later that afternoon by bus and handed him a ticket. The two of them were to go to the bus station separately. The Jewish girl who took him to the photographers arrived and walked casually with him to the bus station. Waiting for the bus was a crowd of people including a number of German soldiers. The charcoal-burning bus arrived and they all got on. It was standing room only by the time Bruno got on, and he found himself tight up against a German soldier, whose regimental dagger kept digging into his side every time the bus hit a bump.

When the bus reached the fishing village of Le Faou the two men got off and Wright followed Labasse to a large house on the outskirts where a very harassed man met them. His wife would not let them into the house because she had become an Anglophobe after discovering that her daughter had had an unfortunate affair with a British soldier and had been left with a small child to bring up. A new host arrived to take him to another safe house. The man, Michael Perrot, shared a two-room apartment with his grandmother, and could not only speak English, but was fluent in German. He used to cultivate friendships with German soldiers and extract information from them that he passed on to the Resistance.

Later that night a man called André visited him and it was his job to interrogate Wright to ensure that he was not a Gestapo plant. Satisfied that he was a genuine escapee, he told Wright that they hoped to get him away by submarine that night and that they would get a message to his wife saying that he was all right.

The next few days were passed in relative luxury. Michael had a part-time job as a butcher and was able to get a reasonable supply of meat. Michael’s grandmother was an excellent cook so the meals were something to be enjoyed. Their apartment was part of a big house, which also housed a dentist’s surgery; consequently Wright had to maintain a very low profile and was confined to one room for most of the day. The evenings were spent talking with Michael about his part in the Resistance. Surprisingly Michael once related an incident during a bombing raid on the harbour when he saw a Manchester bomber attempting to weave its way in and out of the flak before seeing one of its engines hit. Bruno Wright realised that Michael had witnessed the demise of his aircraft.

Then one morning Michael had to go on a mission for the Resistance and Bruno was left alone. Suddenly he heard the rumble of trucks in the street below and peering through the slats in the window, he saw line after line of trucks towing anti-aircraft guns leaving the harbour area. Later he discovered that the pocket battleships had made their famous ‘Channel Break’ after leaving the harbour at Brest. The anti-aircraft guns were no longer required because there was nothing there to defend. It saddened him that all those bombing raids and the loss of life that the raids caused, both aircrews and civilians, was all for nothing.

Michael returned with news that the radio message to his wife had got through. It was now just a question of waiting until the Resistance organisation could get him away. Ten days later Michael returned home with an ashen face. In a small town called Quimper, just 50 miles away, there had been raids on the town by the Gestapo and a number of Resistance fighters had been arrested. The concern now was that the Gestapo would be spreading their net increasingly wider and soon they would be entering Brest. For the next few days the two men lived on tenterhooks and concern for the safety of Michael and his grandmother became a serious concern for Bruno Wright. Escape by submarine was now out of the question, if he was discovered hiding in Michael’s apartment the reprisals would be severe. The tension was becoming almost unbearable and every time a car or lorry went past, they feared that a knock on the door seemed inevitable. Then word came through that Bruno was to be moved to another safe house and that evening Michael and his grandmother had a leaving dinner for him.

At midday the following day, the local veterinarian arrived to collect him and Michael in his car. Because he was the local vet, he was allowed to have a ration of petrol for his car. Bruno Wright was to be taken to the Chateau Tréfry near the small town of Quéménéven and his new hosts were the Comte and Comtesse de Poulpiquet. Their magnificent home was in a secluded area surrounded by acres of farmland, the perfect place for a fugitive to hide.

On their arrival, the Comte and Comtesse, who both spoke excellent English, greeted them. Albert was taken to a third floor of the chateau and told that he was to stay here at all times unless told that he could leave. The three men were invited to stay for dinner after which Michael and the vet left. That evening as dusk fell, Bruno was invited to go for a walk in the extensive grounds of the chateau with the Comtesse. Wearing a hooded coat and clogs, Bruno enjoyed the feeling of freedom and fresh air of the French countryside. The house was run by two servants, both of who were aware of Bruno’s identity, but who were totally trustworthy having been retainers in the family for many years.

As the days passed Bruno got to know his hosts and was surprised to hear that they were not de Gaullists, but favoured Marshal Pétain. They regarded de Gaulle as someone who had deserted his country in times of war and was asking his fellow countrymen to do things that he himself was avoiding. Although the Comtesse was not a member of the Resistance, she was a committed patriot and despised the Germans for invading her country. Her husband, the Comte, had fought at the beginning of the war at the Maginot Line, but was hospitalised with pneumonia that left him with asthma.

At times their talks were tense as they discussed areas in which the British had attacked the French, such as Mers-el-Kebir, when French sailors were killed by British shellfire, and St Nazire, when British commandos attacked the submarine pens there, leaving the inhabitants to suffer the reprisals at the hands of the Germans. Despite these misgivings, both the Comte and the Comtesse were fiercely dedicated to helping allied airmen, and their home became a halfway house for escaping and evading bomber crews.

For the next two months Bruno Wright stayed at the chateau, on the one hand enjoying the luxury, but on the other, impatient to get back to England and see his wife and baby son. It was all that the Comtesse could do to stop him setting off on his own to walk to Spain.

Eventually she came home with the news that she had made contact with a girl who worked for one of the escape lines. How she made contact is not known, but such was the secrecy surrounding all these people that even today the vast majority of these people are still unknown.

The following morning, Bruno and the Comtesse left the chateau to go to Quéménéven to board a train to the town of Angers, where they would be met by a young woman by the name of Yvonne. After changing trains at Quimper, the two of them settled down for the journey, but the Comtesse became concerned about a man who sat opposite them whose luggage, she noticed, bore Berlin labels. She was concerned because Bruno spoke no French and if the man tried to engage him in conversation things could turn difficult. In the corner of the page she was reading she wrote lightly in pencil, ‘Be careful, the man opposite is a German’. Manoeuvring the book slowly, she held it in a position so that Bruno could read what she had written, aware that the man could be watching her.

Fortunately Bruno showed no reaction, but turned his head away and looked out of the window, indicating with his eyebrow that he had read and understood the message. Nevertheless the fear of being caught was with him throughout the journey, and every time the train stopped at a station his blood ran cold when he saw a German uniform on the platform. He had acquired a pair of dark glasses whilst in Angers, which he wore throughout the journey, so he was able to keep the fear from showing his eyes. The train then stopped at Lorien, the main U-boat base for the German navy, and it was obvious from the devastating bomb damage, that it had been the object of many bomber raids. It was at this point that the German left the train, much to the relief of Bruno and the Comtesse.

On reaching Angers, they left the train, and outside the station there was a young girl of about eighteen who saw them and greeted them as old friends. She took them to her parents’ home just outside the town where they were made very welcome. Two days later the Comtesse, who had made several trips into town, returned with news that Bruno was to be on the move again. Preparations were under way for him to be moved into Vichy France. The man organising the escape was Dr Vorch, an eminent physician. He had been organising it from the start, but because the Gestapo had penetrated his organisation he had moved to Vichy France and was operating his section of the organisation from there.

As a parting gift, the Comtesse gave Bruno a pocket-knife, a necessary piece of equipment for his new identity as a French labourer. His new guide was a Jewish psychiatrist, and the pair left that afternoon. It was a sad moment for Bruno, as he had become close to the Comtesse and knew he owed her more than he could ever repay, as indeed he did all the others who had assisted him.