Mention of him in the book Moving Tent being the first British POW of WW2 Also G F Booth taken prisoner
UK, British Prisoners of War, 1939-1945 Name: G F Booth Rank: Warrant Officer Army Number: 561012 Regiment: Royal Air Force : Officers & Other Ranks POW Number: 154 Camp Type: Stalag Camp Number: 357 Camp Location: Kopernikus, Poland Section: Royal Air Force : Officers & Other Ranks Nothing shows on Slattery - he's not in CWGC either, thought he might have died in captivity so checked that as well TD
George Franklin Booth commissioned Pilot Officer (58812) 16 January 1947. Permanent commission as Flight Lieutenant in Equipment Branch 30 August 1952.
Transcripts of radio interviews with the three RAF men shot down over Kiel on the 4th September 1939. Published in the Scotsman 16th September 1939. Pilot Officer Edwards RNZAF Sgt / Observer Booth A/C Air Gunner IJ Slattery (Tipperary, Ireland)
Sergeant Booth and AC1 Slattery ended the war as Warrant Officers being subject to progressive rank promotion while POWs which would be the highest rank they could be promoted to as non commissioned airmen.Commissioned airmen as P/Os and F/Os would attain a maximum rank of F/L. Digressing.......The Third Reich used the interrogation of British POWs as propaganda regarding their humane treatment and welfare,Usually this propaganda was distributed to neutral counties in order to put the regime in good light.The other intention was also to put the POW at ease so that information beyond,name,rank and number could be extracted.The British military authorities countered this ensuring that servicemen were alerted to the ploy. These "friendly" interrogations at the beginning of the war were frequently broadcast to Britain by William Joyce....Lord Haw Haw.Guy Gibson relates a broadcast while on No 83 Squadron at Scampton which went something like. Announcer: "Now tell me Sergeant,are you well?" Sergeant Pilot: (hesitatingly) "Yes,very well" Announcer: "Are you being treated well?" Pause, then: Sergeant Pilot: "Everyone is very kind to me" Announcer: "How is the food you are getting?" A longer pause: Sergeant Pilot "Wonderful, just like home" Gibson recorded that he thought that the Sergeant's questions were obtained through coercion and intimidation at the point of a revolver. Regarding the turning of Russian POWs,the German military magazine Signal in its English version distributed to the Channel Islands and the US, before they entered the conflict, carried propaganda testimonials why they were now fighting against the Bolsheviks.The publication contained a Russian submission with seven more from USSR republics (As an aside,there is an amusing passage in Russell Brandon's The Naked Island where he false praises the Nippon on account of their successes in the Far East arising from a remark that the sun never sets on a map displayed of the British Empire. The guard was taken in by Brandon and gave him a gift cigarettes which Brandon enjoyed and had a laugh about it with his fellow POWs in the absence of the guard.....Brandon drawing on his cigarette remarked to his fellow POWs...."Nippon balls". or so it went..... worth reading)
Aha - reading Guys newspaper I noted that Slattery was given the initials L J so checking again I have found his details ( I was looking for an Ian previously): UK, British Prisoners of War, 1939-1945 Name: L J Slattery Rank: Warrant Officer Army Number: 548555 Regiment: Royal Air Force : Officers & Other Ranks POW Number: 84 Camp Type: Stalag Camp Number: 357 Camp Location: Kopernikus, Poland Section: Royal Air Force : Officers & Other Ranks TD
Laurence Joseph Slattery. No sign of a commission. This may be of interest: Who was "RAF Prisoner No.1"?
I thought the interrogation took a particularly nasty turn when they taunted Booth over his lack of Yorkshire puddings.