Four-Fifty Miles to FreedomJohnston, Maurice Andrew Brackenreed
History
Four-Fifty Miles to Freedom
Johnston, Maurice Andrew Brackenreed
Prisoner-of-war escapes; World War, 1914-1918 -- Prisoners and prisons, Turkish
Although attempts were made to play football, no suitable ground
existed in or near Yozgad, and four-a-side hockey became the form
of recreation which for the majority in the camp provided the best
means of combining pleasure and hard exercise. Hockey was available
at any time of day, as the ground was within the precincts of the
camp, being in fact the lowest of a series of terraces in one of the
gardens belonging to our houses. It was a bare plot, with a hard but
dusty surface, and surrounded on three sides by stone walls: the area
available for play was, perhaps, the length of a cricket pitch and
about ten yards across, so that there was not room for more than a
total of eight players.
[Illustration:
_From a sketch by Capt. E. B. Burns, E. Kent Regt._
COUNTRY KNOWN TO THE LOCAL HUNT CLUB AS "HADES."]
The equipment consisted of a soft leather ball, and for each combatant
a stick made from selected pieces of firewood, shaped according to
fancy, subject to the finished article being passed through a 1½-inch
ring. The resultant game was always fast and often furious, its only
drawback as a means of training for would-be escapers being the not
inconsiderable risk of losing an eye, finger, or portions of an ankle
or knee. The excitement created by such matches as the old camp,
Yozgad, _versus_ the newcomers from Changri, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th,
and 5th teams, reached at times a pitch rarely attained in the most
hotly-contested house-match at an English public school.
For those debarred for any reason from this strenuous form of exercise
there were walks each evening, except on hunting days and Wednesdays.
On the latter days there were, during the summer months, weekly picnics
in the neighbouring pine woods, to which about 50 per cent of the camp
would go.
During daylight intercommunication was allowed between the two groups
of houses: nominally an escort was necessary to accompany such visitors
along the intervening road, but in practice this rule was a dead letter.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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