At the start of the occupation – Leo Harris and his brother Francis was walking to school, and was stopped by a German officer, who then spoke English to the boys to a show off to the other soldiers. The German asks the boys to put there hands out, which they were very reluctant to do, however they did and the German gave them some sweets, Leo and Francis got told top eat them straight away, they did but walked on and spat them down a drain.
Opposite the hotel where Leo Harris was staying, on the promenade, the tide was up , load of Germans were sitting on a raised platform, where a Alsatian dog jumped over the promenade walk and went on the platform and sniffed the Germans, and this dog ended up piddling on a German spine.
There was also street fight between the Germans, they would throw Grenades ‘Potato Mashers’ as the Jersey people referenced them. These Grenades were made up of either a wooden handle and a brass bullet with wooden, tip, these would splinter if they hit a object, this was quite dangerous activity.
If a German officer wasn’t standing to attention as the Sargent wanted, they would be made to, some sergeant would make the Germans fall flat, and they were made to do it over and over if not done properly.
As a lot of Germans couldn’t swim, they taught them by having a rod with some rope and they would hold them up on the water, to teach them, some officer would take advantage and try to lower the rope so the Germans would go fully under.
There was also a Jersey version of a gestapo.
Leo, Francis, and a couple of there friends stole 3 German rifles and lots of anumition, The gestapo visited the hotel Where the Harris family lived, they had kept the rifles in a window pane, Leos dad also kept his English rifle at this place.
His dad ordered Francis to hide the rifles in there store in the town, they did this by strapping the rifles to his bike and hiding them with tape and the anumition in a green bag on the handlebars.
The German Officers ‘Wolf’, ‘Eric’, ‘Carl’, ‘Bernard’ – these officers visited the hotel in order to find the rifles, these also dressed up a civilians, for example Carl dressed up in Austrian clothes, which was Austrian hunting gear, which was the colour green, whereas the others were in waistcoats and medallion to show they were part of the gestapo.
At this time, Leo was aged 14,
Francis was then questioned about making crystal radio sets, this was done by Carl.
However the Germans didn’t realize that underneath the kitchen was a little cellar, where there was stolen German bicycles.
One of the Germans when searching found a khaki green bag, this was stolen from a German bunker this contained cigarettes, Chocolate, tins of meat.
In the kitchen on the stove there was one of the tins of meat that was stolen, as the family wasn’t allowed to do anything, this got burnt, the mothered ended up putting on the kitchen taps and pouring it down the sink.
The Gestapo ended up Taking Leo’s dad and his brother Francis to the German prison, 5 days later they accused his father of being the leader of a French resistance. However with Francis they let him out of prison for a day to go and collect the rifle however on the way back to the prison he stopped at the rifle barrack at green street, he opened and looked at the positioning of guns. then he goes back to prison.
Hitler ordered that any english born citizen which was born in Jersey to be deported, however this never happened.
Liberation:
There was lots of cheering at various squares around the island.
The public demanded that liberation was actually the 8th of May, instead the government said it was the 9th of May.
Leo Harris’s family liberation was very different to others, firstly they went to a garage where they had a car, they drove to the Gestapo court, his dad got out and a German called Spurnard, who lived Kings cliff Queens Rd, here he got back his wireless and two automatic pistols. After they went home.
In the morning after, his father had not got back his son Francis, as the war was over, he went to the prison, where he demanded to have his son, they accepted.
Here I have selected the images I wan to edit and discard.I have then colour coded the images I selected. The green represent the ones I liked and are going to edit, the yellow represents the images I like but I am not going to edit as the are either duplicates or slightly blurry. this selection has left me with 9 images to work work with.
First Edit:
I have used the Before and After view to see what version I like, and want to use, I have decided to go with black and white.I have edited the Exposure to -0.83, and the contrast to -29, by doing this I have lowered the brightness, but slightly increased it.Here I have edited the highlights to increase the white in the background so its not dark, but I also edited the shadows to decrease the amount that you couldn’t see, i used it so u could see the pattern in his jacket.
