saint venant 1940-------farm boulet

[Verrieres]

Over the years I have often had a small nagging doubt that the Q57 and Q80 referred to after Anthony Corkhills name may not be a reference to Forms Q especially as we have not unearthed any direct link to Forms Q ,St Venant and War Crimes indeed we are constantly running into brick walls in our quest to uncover leads.
Tonight was different in my possession I have a couple of pages from The Royal Berks `Missing Men` file again we have several Q57 references but one in particular is, in my eyes anyhow, quite significant. Halfway down the list is the words `5332412 BAKER DIED Q57` Baker was MURDERED there is a War Crimes File documenting his murder, his identification and the investigation in 1946 for the trial. BAKERs case was one of four selected to represent those war crimes reported in May 1940 from the SIX documented in the War Crimes file. Ironic that the last of the two not selected was the murder of a British soldier in Ferme Boulet from which this thread has taken its name/lead ?

Seasons Greetings to All

Jim

[chow]

Thanks Jim.

Have a great Christmas and new year.

A very interesting thread this...I am sure the answer is out there.

maybe one of the two files you mention..

All the best I look forward to more posts on this..

Steve..aka..chow

[ivor43]

hi.
thanks Jim,
seasons greetings to you.
Your last post stirred a niggle i have had for a while re the war crimes files.
Some time ago i wrote re a piece of 'SS' nastiness named Dix. i think he was involved with murders in the St Venant area. and i speculated that he might have been involved in shooting troops in hospital, possibly Anthony.
unfortunately he got himself killed before the end of the war.
Now. as you say not all files were used in prosecution, would have been too many, but what i have been wondering is. when a prosecution has been completed the file would be kept. but if a known murderer was investigated and a file prepared, if it was then found the person had died, what would happen to the file.
would it be buried. there seems to be very few prosecutions for war crimes relating to 1940's so what is the possibility that there are somewhere a heap of files lying around that could not be used which might contain references to many more murders.
The reports re Anthony's murder and others must be somewhere. if we accept the authority's don't have them. then where are they??????.


ivor

[teecee1941]

I would like to say thank you to everyone who has contributed, viewed, talked about or even just thought about this thread. I really appreciate it. I wish you all a peaceful and happy Christmas and a healthy and prosperous New Year.

Thank you,

Tony

[dcdl12976]

Same to you Tony, im sure I speak for all involved when I say we are only sorry we have not been able to help fully and solve this for you SO FAR but don't give up hope new avenues may open up mate.

[dcdl12976]

Jim, I would think the reason the other two Q forms were not used for prosecution was because there were no witnesses and therefore would not have stood as evidence, this would mean the cases are still open and help to explain why they are likely held by MI. I think just maybe one of the men in the hospital was Anthony. Don't forget it may not have been the assaulting units that perpetrated these crimes, more likely he following Feldendarmerie (Field Police) following up one of whose jobs was to search for and round up stragglers, escapees and wounded or hidden enemy.

May be worth contacting the Wiesenthal center see if the have any info on this after all they have been chasing the perpetrators of war crimes for many years with great success.

It would be interesting too see the other pages as el mate if possible.

Ivor, do you have a first name for Dix mate ? it my be useful to investigate him fully.

[Verrieres]

Bearing in mind the NA website has stated that Forms Q are not with them but possibly in the case files of the relevant investigations .Touching on what Dave has said about open cases I took a look online to see if I could find out who might hold these papers? Remember there were only four selected for trial and we have found no mention of Anthony of the DLI in any of them so I believe if they were used at all it was only as background and not actually submitted as evidence. If not then they are still with the MoD or NA.
Moving on I found a reference to Microfilm of Documents ;-
http://www.archives.gov/research/cap...film/t1021.pdf

GERMAN DOCUMENTS AMONG THE WAR CRIMES RECORDS OF THE
JUDGE ADVOCATE DIVISION, HEADQUARTERS, UNITED STATES ARMY, EUROPE
Introduction
Many German documents from the World War II period are contained in the war crimes case files of
Headquarters, United States Army Europe (HQ USAREUR), Judge Advocate Division, dated 1945-58.
These files contain transcripts of trial testimony, clemency petitions, affidavits, prosecution exhibits,
photographs of concentration camps, etc., as well as original German documents used as evidence in the
prosecution of the numerous war crimes cases, excluding the Nuremberg Trials, concerning atrocities in
concentration camps, atrocities committed on Allied military personnel and Allied fliers who crash landed
in Germany, and other crimes. Only the German documents predating May 8, 1945, have been included
in this filming project.
A data sheet describing the material in each folder microfilmed is included before the items filmed. The
Judge Advocate Division file number has been used to identify each item wherever given. In other
instances whatever identifying information is available, such as the case or exhibit number, has been
given as the item number. Overall provenance for the records is HQ USAREUR. Judge Advocate
Division, as all German documents in the files were made a permanent part of the records of that office;
however, the original German provenance of the items filmed is given as the provenance on the data
sheets.

In the Index is a single file relating to St Venant and another possibly associated

000-11-102, Vol. I
Wehrmacht Graboffizier Karten
Grave registration card of deceased German military personnel of SS-Germania
Division, who died at St Venant, France, on May 25 and 27, 1940

000-11-103, Vol. I
Ortskommandantur Bethune Feldpostnummer 33098
Kriegsgräber
Report of the Ortskommandantur Behtune to the mayor of Lestrom, France, concerning
the listing of German and foreign military graves on index cards. Sep. 1,
1940

It would be interesting to find something else related to St Venant but even this scrap proves efforts were made to identify those units present/responsible for whatever occurred during May 1940

Jim

[ivor43]

morning all.

while browsing stuff on ''War Crimes'' i found the following interesting article.

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-st...s-8640776.html



ivor

[dcdl12976]

So once again we have reference to MI9 then

[ivor43]

hi.
yes.
MI 19. appears to be a very shadowy set up. what i also find interesting is the date of the article. 26/12. i wonder. could be an interesting programme on Sunday.


ivor