To understand his grandfather’s past, one Citrus College professor found himself on an exciting but somber journey halfway across the world.
“I wouldn’t call it a vacation,” Citrus College mathematics professor Paul Swatzel said. “It was more like a pilgrimage.”
Swatzel’s grandfather, Pvt. Walter McGarrigle, was in the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps. He was a prisoner of war, captured during the Dieppe raid in northern France.
The Dieppe raid happened on Aug. 19, 1942, and was the first allied-led attack against German forces in France. In the first 10 hours, 3,623 of the 6,086 men had been killed, wounded or became a prisoner of war. McGarrigle was one of those captured.
Swatzel said his grandfather died in 1987 of leukemia. He started looking deeper into his grandfather’s war history about 10 years ago.
“I was always interested in the war,” Swatzel said. “ … As a kid I remember my grandfather watching war clips to see if he could spot himself in any.
“I remember messing around on Facebook. I found this group called ‘Blue Beach, every man remembered.’ I knew my grandfather landed on Blue Beach.”
The Facebook group organized a 21 person, two-week trip to retrace footsteps of men who fought on Blue Beach. Swatzel went to help understand his grandfather’s life during the war.
Historian David O’Keefe, who was on the trip, said most on the trip had relatives in the war.
“We were crossing the fair to Dieppe, and it was a misty day,” he said. “The mist lifted as we got 2 miles off the coast. It was like a curtain had lifted. Here was the fear that was Dieppe. It was amazing to watch the faces. These are the stories they had been hearing their whole life.”
Linnie Brown, who was retracing her father’s own past, said she enjoyed the two-week trip traveling through France, Poland and Germany, but coming back home is where she processed the events of her father, Pvt. George Proctor, Royal Regiment of Canada, went through.
“My father died in 1975,” Brown said. “… We knew my father was in the war, we knew he was a prisoner of war, but he never spoke about it. I took my son with me, who never met his grandfather. …He always had a fascination with him. Being there, really sensing it… seeing what he went through… it’s remarkable what these men endured.”
Swatzel said during the war, the Nazi’s started marching prisoners hundreds of kilometers toward Germany in an effort to retain the prisoners of war.
McGariggle, Swatzel’s grandfather, had somehow broken his ankle during what came to be known as the “Death Marches.” Proctor, Brown’s father, had carried the injured McGarrigle for months to avoid him being shot. They were both severely dehydrated, malnourished and tortured.
Swatzel said during the trip, the group revisited sites his grandfather was held at, as well as other historic World War II sites. The sites include Dieppe, the prison camp he was marched from in Poland, and Auschwitz.
“Auschwitz was very emotional,” he said. “I completely broke down at one point.”
Swatzel said he had dreams two or three weeks after his trip, and that it was hard for him to sleep.
Swatzel said after visiting one of the memorials in France where 20 Canadian soldiers were executed by Nazis, he felt like something had drawn him back into the area after his party had left.
“I walked in there by myself, in the one area where the men were,” he said. “I had this strange feeling come over me, and I had to get out of that courtyard. I just lost it in front of the whole group.”
Swatzel said everyone in the group had broken down at some point during the emotional two-week journey through the past.
