Only fragments survive to witness the passage of more than 60,000 people interned in the Camp of Rivesaltes between 1942 and 1966.
One of the most successful escape routes for allied airmen wishing to cross the border into Spain was right here in the P-O, known as the Pat Line, after the man who set it up.
O’Leary radioed London with the message “Pas plus de bateau que de beurre au cul!”
British soldiers, arriving at the camp in April 1945 were met with around 10,000 unburied corpses lying where they had died.
The war is nearing it’s end. The Germans occupying France are on edge and expecting the Allied Invasion at any time.
The Comet line, so named because of the speed needed to whisk stranded airmen down through occupied France to safety, helped hundreds of allied soldiers and airmen to escape from occupied France.
We all learn differently, and as we grow older, one of the greatest blocks to learning is memory. And yet many of us can still sing along to new songs – and remember the words!
During the Second World War, resistance movements in the Pyrenees-Orientales helped hundreds of refugees, allied soldiers and airmen to escape from occupied France across the border into Spain.
One day in August 1944 we were told “OK, boys, here we go.”
Young Australian Bruce Dowling arrived in France in 1938 to improve his French. He ended up helping hundreds of allied servicemen to escape from occupied France and paid the ultimate price, beheaded by the Nazis 29th birthday in 1943.