Key to Escape Committee success underground, was a sense of situation normal above ground. Late in February 1944 – as he had done for nearly four years – Canadian Barry Davidson ensured that life among the kriegies didn’t skip a beat. As indicated in his diaries, Pilot Officer Davidson wrote that inside Stalag Luft III he assumed role of a scrounger.
“I tried digging in the tunnels,” he wrote, “but I got claustrophobic.”
So, Davidson went to work managing the contents of the Red Cross parcels – chocolate, coffee, cigarettes – into a war chest of bribery devices that could help his X Organization comrades “tame” North Compound guards. By putting such valuables into the hands of malleable guards, the escape committee could procure the makings of digging tools, the loan of a camera, and raw materials that would become the basis for an arsenal of forged documents.
An avid sportsman as well, Davidson helped secure sports gear – tennis rackets, baseballs and bats, and – for the winter of 1944 – hockey sticks and skates. Because of his contacts, Davidson helped authorities import hockey gear from the YMCA and Morgan’s department store back in Canada.
The equipment provided kriegies some welcome recreation in a game they loved, but the hardwood from hockey sticks also burned long and hot in the barracks stoves and used skate blades often enjoyed a second life as a cutting/digging tool for the tunnellers. Thus, as the ground froze above the tunnellers, out in the appell/playground, the product of Davidson’s scrounging generated scores of hockey games, making life inside Stalag Luft III look normal … even as Tunnel “Harry” moved closer to completion.