MEMORIES OF ROY BUTLER

The above picture is from Roy Butler titled "The Way To Dulag Luft"

Some details will vary with each person's experience, of course. In this description, it lists a chair, a bed, and a table in the cell. In my case there was a bed which could as well be classified a table. It didn't amount to much more. Nothing else. After one or two nights there solo, three or four men were brought in, so the floor turned out to be no more uncomfortable than the bed. Of course, at age nineteen, one can sleep on concrete.

The above picture is also drawn by Roy Butler entitled "Interrogation"

As to food, I received one slice of dark bread in the morning with the terrible ersatz coffee (I later saw a German guard take a sip of the coffee and spit it out), a bowl of potato soup for lunch, then another slice of bread at night. I don't recall if it was the same sawdust bread we got in the stalags, but it was not so good.
Our lack of appreciation for the food was influenced by the fact that a couple of days before we were eating well at a  messhall in England.

This recipe is what we got in the stalags. This recipe comes from the official record from the Food Providing Ministry published as Top Secret Berlin 24.X1-1941 from the director of Ministry Herr Mansfeld and Herr Moritz. It was agreed that the best mixture to bake black bread was:
                                                                  
         50% bruised rye grain
         20% sliced sugar beets
         20% tree flour ( sawdust )
         10% minced leaves and straw

I learned to like it and look forward to the ration.

The effects of suddenly going from carefree youth to prisoner of war in a totally different society and setting can't well be described, but has a lot to do with our memories of the place. It could have been so much worse in many ways.

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