PRISONER OF WAR
[Bridgnorth Journal, 30th November, 1918]

15626 Pte. G. Butler, 11th Corps, Cyclist Battalion, whose home is at 23 Railway Street, Bridgnorth, and who has been a prisoner of war in German hands, is now in King George’s Hospital, London. An extract from a letter, relating his experiences as a prisoner, says: “You can guess the anxiety, many of our fellows dying of broken hearts and starvation. There were innumerable cases of our shells killing our own fellows, as we have been slaves for the Germans just behind the lines. The last two months we had been in Belgium, and we were released from a place called Leinbech, the other side of Brussels. We have received not a morsel of food from the Red Cross, and we knew there were parcels for us; but the German beasts have got to pay the penalty for this now. I walked 50 kilometres in bare feet, so the first British troops we met made a fuss of us. I was put on a stretcher, and four days later was in a Canadian hospital.”