15 miles away to a place called westertimke, where they built another camp called milag nord. the trouble here in westertimke is that there is no physical evidence of the camp that was here, the camp where my grandfather spent most of his time in captivity. it was beyond these trees somewhere. but all that remains of that camp today is this memorial to the 5,000 merchant seamen who were held here. how many of them would stop at this memorial, do you think? v0: but that s not the only memorial to the merchant navy, of course the most prominent of which is here in greenwich, a reminder of the dangers the men faced. you ve a 50% chance of not making it at these peak points in the conflict and conditions would be poor, your pay was poor and your recognition was also not up there with the armed forces. without the merchant navy, we could not have won world war ii. it s as simple as that.
family photo, which was taken after the war and my grandfather s return after four years away. he d gone to sea in the first instance at the age 01:14 in 1920. it was the natural thing to do for the boys in the village. but, as he told me many years later, never could he have imagined that that first voyage as a merchant seaman would lead, eventually, to three years in a german prisoner of war camp. newsreel: this is a story of the men who brave the dangers of the sea to bring us our daily bread. the men of the merchant navy faced terrifying danger as they kept britain supplied with food and raw materials. all too often, they were easy targets for the german battleships and u boats. the u boats used to hunt in packs and they always aimed for the merchant ships because they were seen as being the ships that were keeping britain and the other places afloat.
to the 5,000 merchant seamen who were held here. how many of them would stop at this memorial, do you think? v0: but that s not the only memorial to the merchant navy, of course the most prominent of which is here in greenwich, a reminder of the dangers the men faced. you ve a 50% chance of not making it at these peak points in the conflict and conditions would be poor, your pay was poor and your recognition was also not up there with the armed forces. without the merchant navy, we could not have won world war ii. it s as simple as that. my grandfather did make it home to west wales before the end of the war and, despite fragile health, he lived to the age of 85 always modest, always hardworking and always grateful. in a rare comment on his difficult wartime experience, he said simply this i was very lucky. and he always thought of the tens of thousands
an advance diving technique diving with a mixture of mostly helium, and diver propulsion vehicles to move us around. we re laden with heavy tanks and using closed circuit breathers, so quite a technical dive and a lot to be considered. it is at about 83 metres deep so getting to the limit a human diver can take really. it sounds like an extraordinary feat and the submarine itself, the uss grenadier is quite an extraordinary story and an emotional one. tell us a little bit more about it. i think so. it was out on patrol in the area when it was attacked by some japanese aeroplane. and the vessel was damaged, it sunk to the bottom. they spent 13 hours trying to repair the systems, managed to get back to the surface so that they were surrounded and they had to basically scuttle the ship so tank it on purpose to stop it from falling into enemy hands. then they were taken prisoner and there s been some
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