Leslie Wallace Lauste MBE (1908–2001): Brighton surgeon and prisoner of war in occupied Europe

Early life (1908–1938)

Leslie Lauste (Figure 1) was born on 30 March 1908 in South London to French filmmaker Emile (1880–1947) and Bessie Lauste, nee Turley (1880-1955). ^1,2 Emile had served in the First World War and was awarded the Croix de Guerre. ^1,2 Emile’s father was an inventor who had worked with Thomas Edison and patented the first ever sound-on-film technology, known colloquially as a “talkie”. ³

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Figure 1.

Leslie Lauste (1972) wearing the presidential medal of the Brighton and Sussex Medico-Chirurgical Society at the Royal Pavilion, Brighton. Brighton and Sussex Medico-Chirurgical Society Archive (reproduced with the kind permission of the society).

After playing truant during his early school years Lauste settled at Archbishop Tenison’s High School ² in Croydon and here he first considered a career in medicine. ² Despite unsuccessful attempts to enter Cambridge University, ² he was awarded a scholarship to St Thomas’ Hospital in London, noting that his family would not have been able to support him financially otherwise. ² Qualifying in 1932, he was appointed, in 1938, to Brighton to work in obstetrics and gynaecology. ² Sensing that war was imminent ¹ he joined the territorial army and was attached to the 21st General Hospital in Eastbourne. He was commissioned as Captain shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War. ^1,4

The outbreak of war and capture (1939–1941)

During 1939 Lauste was seconded to Shorncliffe Military Hospital but returned to Eastbourne in 1940. ^2,4,5 His unit was then transferred to France, crossing by boat from Southampton to Le Havre. ⁴ He travelled to Dannes-Camiers Hospital Centre, near Boulogne-Sur-Mer. ² The initial calm was shattered on the 10th of May 1940 when Germany invaded France and the Low Countries. ^5,6 Lauste reports the bombing of a nearby village and his sudden evacuation from the Dannes-Camiers hospital centre to the town of Boulogne. ² Boulogne, in turn, had been recently abandoned by the 16th General Hospital, leaving it without medical services. ² Now a Major and the senior officer in his unit, ² Lauste decided to continue providing clinical care rather than seeking to evacuate, despite being fully aware that Royal Navy destroyers had arrived in Boulogne harbour for evacuation. ^2,4 The German attack followed on 22nd May and the town fell three days later. ^2,6 Numerous casualties were taken to Lauste and his unit during four days of intense fighting: ²

“Wounded were being brought in and we were busy in the operating theatre. I remember a tea break and when we returned … a large mass of metal had smashed through the window and was lying on the operating table. ⁴ ”

Stadtroda prisoner of war camp, Thuringia (1941–1943)

The POW hospital at Stadtroda served Stalag IX-C. ^9,10 Although the camp was originally for Polish troops, its population became increasingly diverse as the war ran its course. This included French and Belgians from the Battle of France, British troops from Dunkirk and later North Africa, as well as Russians and Yugoslavians from the Nazi invasion of their borders. ^10,11 Little information survives on the Stadtroda Hospital: according to Lauste on his arrival it comprised two-hundred beds inside a former tobacco factory. ^10,11 It seems likely the site was on the grounds of the current Stadtroda Hospital based upon a description of the views surrounding the hospital provided in a brief Red Cross Report, ¹¹ a 1938 map of the town, ¹² and Lauste’s description of its close proximity to an existing civilian hospital. ¹⁰ The operations performed by Lauste demonstrate that surgery in a hospital serving a POW camp was essentially general in nature and not trauma-focussed. ¹⁰ The commonest operations at the start of Lauste’s time at Stadtroda included hernia reduction and appendicectomy. ¹⁰ He was assisted by a Scottish pathologist, William Mackay Davidson (1909-1991 ¹³ ), who had trained in anaesthetics and normally administered ether or hexobarbital, with chloroform occasionally used. ¹⁰ As the medical staff received small amounts of camp money, they saved up to purchase a cystoscope and some German medical textbooks. ^4,8,10 Lauste reflects that they were granted remarkable freedom as medical staff, not just in being able to save up camp money, but even in being allowed to travel to other hospitals where surgical opinions were needed. ¹⁰ He also found time to draft a paper on the development of osteomyelitis following gunshot wounds. ¹⁴ These freedoms contributed to Lauste having a surprisingly positive recollection of his time at Stadtroda:

“Stadtroda was a very happy time. ² ” “It was by far the best time during the five years I was a prisoner. A busy job, a small mess who got on well together, contact with other nationals and the Germans and a quiet peaceful area. ⁴ ”

The only mass emergency trauma situation recorded by Lauste followed the disastrous Dieppe raid by Canadian, British and other allied troops in August 1942. ^2,10,18 The great number of casualties captured after the Dieppe assault meant many were sent as far as Stadtroda for surgery and recovery. ¹⁸ Mostly these were Canadians, but also some British officers. ^2,18 Lauste reports that some of the injured came in without any serious illness, apparently seeking respite from the stresses of camp life. ^2,11 Such claims are corroborated in a 2005 interview ¹⁹ with an American POW admitted with vomiting:

“I pretended that the pain was in my lower right abdomen and when he prodded me there I would let out a cry. I was ordered immediately to hospital in the town of Stadtroda with appendicitis. I myself was pretty sure that was not the problem … I told the doctor the method by which I had been admitted and he was greatly amused. ‘You did quite right to get yourself admitted through lies’ he said, ‘but we will put you right.’ Major Lauste was the Englishman’s name and he was a real gentleman. ¹⁹ ”

Some letters written by Lauste during the war years survive. ²⁰ In one he thanks a French lady in Lille for a parcel and, cryptically, for finding him a “Mariane. ²⁰ ” One notable patient was the Kent cricketer, future MP, and television personality, Aidan Crawley (1908-1993 ²¹ ), who was bought to Stadtroda after capture at the Siege of Tobruk in Egypt. ^2,22 He and other officers were normally kept on a separate ward, but, to their great frustration, the high number of casualties from Dieppe meant sharing ward space with lower-ranks. ² Tensions subsided when medical staff ensured the officers were given their own space again as discharges began. ² Crawley later became famous for his attempts to escape from various camps. ²² Lauste tried to discourage patients from escaping via the hospital, a location considered to be less secure than the main camp. ^2,8 The discouragement was driven by threats made to Lauste that, if any POWs escaped, the hospital would lose freedoms as well as the right to refer patients to other hospitals. ²

German treatment of prisoners of war

Following the arrival of large numbers of Russian troops at Stalag IX-C the hospital at Stadtroda began to deal with more tuberculosis cases. ¹⁰ Many of these were quite advanced on presentation, and Lauste reports surgically managing tuberculosis-associated peritonitis frequently. ¹⁰ The Russians also presented with frostbite and starvation ¹⁰ and attempts to refeed often proved futile. The death rate was reduced by initiating small amounts of milk powder and weaning the prisoners back on to food, ¹⁰ reflecting modern methods of refeeding after starvation. ²³ The condition of many Russian POWs on arrival alludes to how differently Slavic troops, particularly Russians, were treated in comparison to POWs from Western European and North American nations. ²⁴

It is well documented that Russian troops were selectively treated worse than other POWs. ²⁴ They were infamously the first test subjects of the gas chambers of Auschwitz, ²⁵ driven by Nazi ideology that identified Slavic people as an inferior race. ²⁴ This attitude towards Russians was witnessed by Lauste at Stadtroda; ^8,10 for instance they were only given 1000 kilocalories of food daily whilst British prisoners received 1500 kilocalories. ¹⁰ Moreover, the Red Cross were able to provide food packages to all prisoners, except Russians. ² Contrasting the Russians, Slavic POWs, such as Serbians and Poles, were allowed adjuvant food packages sent from their homelands or from the United States, ^2,10 demonstrating Nazi racial hierarchy even within Slavic populations. ²⁴ Lauste and other medical staff realised the food supply to the Russians was going to limit their recovery from surgery on the wards ^2,10 and consequently gave some of their own food to the Russians. ¹⁰

The mistreatment of Russians, along with worsening conditions on the Eastern Front, meant that more Russians were dying in POW camps. ²⁴ A further difference recorded by Lauste in the German treatment of Russian personnel lay in their treatment after death. ¹⁰ When a British soldier died in the hospital, they were buried with military honours in a local cemetery. As there was no chaplain at Stadtroda, Lauste conducted the funeral service himself on multiple occasions. ^1,10 Matters were not managed with the same dignity and respect for the Russian dead, who were buried in nearby woodland, without a funeral service and in unmarked graves. ¹⁰ Lauste records all deceased patients received a post-mortem examination. ⁴

Lauste was given a copy of the Geneva Convention by the Red Cross, and reports that there were some clashes between himself, as well as other medical staff, with German officers who were not abiding by the convention. ⁸ However, Lauste notes that German troops would normally respect the convention once reminded of its rules, ⁴ although he offers no examples of where such disagreements came from.

From Stadtroda to Lamsdorf (1943)

In March 1943 Lauste was moved, ⁵ along with many other prisoners, without explanation. ² His journey ended in Treysa, at a hospital for French and Russian patients that served Stalag IX-A. ^2,4 Lauste worked with an elderly German surgeon, operating on POWs from the camp and injured Germans. ² This was short-lived however, as during a game of football Lauste fell and broke both his wrists. ² Unable to operate, he was kept with other POWs and reports that he began to feel low for the first time in the war:

“I had a bit of depression there … because this was about three years … I don’t think you can be locked up longer than that without having an effect. ² ”

Although most Oflags did not allow officers to work there was an exception for medical staff. ²⁶ Lauste’s experience here was fortunately brief, although reported crimes against the Geneva Convention at British oflags were limited in comparison to those against Slavic officers. ^27,28 For example, Oflag IV-C in Saxony, better known as Colditz Castle, was famous for the respect between prisoners and guards despite high-profile British officers being held there and numerous escape attempts. ²⁷ In contrast, accounts of Oflag IX-C in Thuringia by Red Cross inspectors reported greater similarity to the concentration camps than to other POW camps. ^24,28 Escapee prisoners there were executed, whilst at Colditz they received a period of isolation. ^24,27,28

Lauste asked to return to clinical work once his wrists had recovered, and consequently he was sent to Stalag VIII-B at Lamsdorf, in Silesia. ^2,5 Lauste’s two day train journey east took him through Leipzig and Dresden in December 1943, where he witnessed the consequence of allied air raids. Seeing cities destroyed by bombs left him with deep concern over the purpose and value of such raids:

“Once the mass bombing of German towns was established I thought this was wrong. It was clear that this was not of military value, but a vengeance objective to destroy German heritage and with it the people, so really genocide. I think it prolonged rather than shortened the war by increasing German resistance. ⁴ ”

Lamsdorf POW camp (1943–1945)

Lauste stayed at Lamsdorf until March 1945. ⁵ Despite being within modern Poland, Lauste reports the camp contained largely British personnel. ² Although he stayed here for a year Lauste made comparatively little comment about it in his memoirs, possibly because of how well organised and how routine his time at the hospital was there. ^2,4 For his work he gives examples of amputations, perforated ulcer repairs, gastrectomy and tuberculosis complications. ^2,4 Here Lauste describes further freedoms for medical staff. He was permitted to play football and cricket, dine with Indian POWs, play chess, hike through the countryside and even go bilberry picking ^2,4 ; it was a time Lauste appears to have remembered fondly:

“[It] was extremely well run … I think we had really a, certainly a most comfortable time and altogether a very happy time. ² ”

Trains were loaded full of POWs and taken to an unknown destination. ² Lauste boarded the first train as the senior medical officer, stating it was a goods train that was “thirty to forty wagons long. ² ” Four carriages were filled with British and German medical supplies, but the other wagons contained POWs, locked in with wire wrapped around the doors. Lauste’s carriage was an exception after he negotiated with the German officer in charge of the train. ² If the prisoners were fit, up to forty were kept in one wagon, but elsewhere as few as sixteen would fill the wagon. ⁴ Lauste was in the front carriage with Stanley Sykes alongside the most acutely unwell patients, including two they had operated on just the day before. ⁴ In freezing weather, with snow outside, the train trundled through the German-occupied countryside for five days. ⁴ They would stop just once a day for sanitary purposes. ⁴ He reports that there was a very noticeable presence of allied planes overhead, flying above the train at least once a day. ⁴ This caused anxiety as the train would have been a likely target, and Lauste recalls one occasion when they pulled over as planes flew overhead:

“We were in a railway siding in Czechoslovakia (…) when the air raid sirens went off and an enormous flight came over. And I said, ‘we are for it now because this is a military target.’ So, I got out and started to undo the wires, but I just couldn’t do it. So, I had to give up, but fortunately we weren’t attacked … but the weather was bad. If it wasn’t for that, I think we probably, certainly would have been. And with people wired in there was no hope for escape at all. ² ”

Moosburg and the German retreat (1945)

Moosburg was the largest POW camp in Germany during the Second World War. ³³ It was a kilometre north of the town of Moosburg in Bavaria, and by the end of the war it was holding up to 110,000 POWs. ³³ Upon Lauste’s arrival the camp was already beyond its capacity, so only four hundred were taken from the train, with priority given to medical staff and the wounded. ² At this point Nazi propaganda had provoked fear amongst the prisoners of the so-called Alpine Redoubt, ³⁴ supposedly planned by Heinrich Himmler to prolong the war, and for Lauste this justified the mass movement of POWs into Bavaria. ² However, it is now understood that the Alpine Redoubt of Bavaria and Northern Italy was simply Nazi propaganda. ³⁴ On arrival, Lauste was the senior allied medical officer at the camp and began work at the hospital, which had over two thousand beds. ^2,4 Other medical staff were concerned about low rations and slow repatriation, so he decided to confront the Chefarzt on this- but only succeeded in causing the Chefarzt to become extremely angry. ² Lauste became fearful that both he and Sykes would be moved into the Oflag, and he was particularly anxious about the impact this could have on Sykes’ weakening health. ² In an act of desperation, he went to the camp commandant to air his concerns about being moved to the Oflag, the low rations and the slow repatriation process. Unbeknown to Lauste, the camp commandant disliked the Chefarzt, and on hearing how angry this could make him decided to countermand the decision. ² The Commandant decreed that Lauste and Sykes continue to work in the hospital and should not be sent to the Oflag, and the problems with rations were also improved. Lauste was given upgraded accommodation and a special access pass, granting him greater freedom within the camp beyond even most Germans. ²

Surgery at Moosburg was limited by overcrowding and a lack of heating in the theatre, meaning that only emergency procedures were undertaken. ² These included perforated ulcers, gangrenous amputations, and trauma cases. ² As more troops arrived many had been injured by allied attacks on trains or made to walk huge distances in what became known as ‘The Long March’. ³⁵ At one point a troop of British soldiers arrived after a two-month march from Poland. One by one the soldiers were assessed on arrival, then they were showered and any who were too ill to continue marching were kept in Moosburg. ² Those deemed fit enough would continue their march to another camp that had space for them. ²

Lauste reports Moosburg was uneasy during his time there. ^2,4 Many doctors tried to escape, but with conditions worsening from overcrowding Lauste counselled them to stay and treat the POWs. ² Some doctors were required to temporarily leave the camp to meet convoys of POWs too weak to reach the camp. Rumours of lawlessness beyond the camp ² instilled fear in many doctors and some refused to leave. ^2,4 This included a pair of American doctors. ^2,4 On orders of the camp commandant, Lauste asked them to leave the camp to help or face being taken out at gunpoint by the Germans. The moral dilemma of this threat was eased for Lauste by his shock to find that the American doctors had been operating a private practice within the camp and charging prisoners for their services: ²

“I was absolutely horrified. They were not doing their job, not doing their duty, which was to look after their people. ² ”

Before his repatriation Lauste accompanied a Swiss Red Cross worker, Pierre Moch, ² back to Switzerland after he was injured by British bombs shortly before the camp was liberated. ² Travelling via Munich, he was saddened to see further destruction from allied air raids. ^2,4 He could not cross the Swiss border due to their neutrality and returned to Moosburg for repatriation in April 1945. ^2,4,5

After the war

Lauste reported that he been “well throughout the five years [as a POW] as were most doctors. ⁴ ” He reported that he did not lose weight between the start and the end of the war. ² He reflected that as a POW he made “wonderful friends ⁴ ” but that after the war did not become what he termed “professional POWs with numerous reunions and associations. ⁴ ” Lauste returned to work in Brighton where he completed his training in obstetrics and gynaecology and became a surgical consultant working at the Royal Sussex County, Hove General, and Royal Alexandra hospitals. In 1945 he was awarded an MBE for his wartime work. ⁴ Later, in 1972 he became president of the Brighton and Sussex Medical-Chirurgical society ³⁶ (Figure 1). He also had a keen interest in the history of medicine and and lectured at the Royal Society of Medicine on Richard Russell, ³⁵ an 18th century physician whose sea water treatment transformed Brighton into a popular resort. ³⁵ Lauste also published the first historical account of the hospitals of the city. ³⁷ He travelled extensively ⁴ and in 1987 he published an account of being a patient in Soviet Russia after falling ill with pneumonia whilst visiting nearby Mongolia. ³⁸ He was also a member of the Linnaean Society ³⁹ and vice-president of the Brighton and Hove Regency Society. ⁴⁰ Lauste also built a relationship with South Eastern Screen Archives, where he deposited the remains of his father’s work, which included videos of himself soon after repatriation. ⁴¹ He died, aged 92, in 2001 at the Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton. ⁴²

Conclusion: Liberty, language, and luck

This research deepens understanding of the life of Leslie Lauste. ¹ He reflected on his wartime experiences deeply, often remembering it fondly and as a time when he very rarely felt in danger and made the following comparison with peacetime care:

“It is remarkable how few complications or problems we had with patients. I remember far more in a well-staffed civilian hospital in England. This was I think because of continuity of responsibility and treatment, which is often lacking in England today. ⁴ ”

Lauste’s memoirs reveal commitment to and compassion for patients of all nationality. His medical professionalism is evident in his refusal to seek evacuation from occupied France, his negotiations with camp commanders and his clinical leadership at (and travelling between) diverse POW camps. Nevertheless, Lauste also recognised his own failings:

“It was possible for some doctors to make themselves comfortable and not do enough for their patients or their staff. I, for example, was very comfortable at Treysa but concerned with my own problems, rather than those of others and realise now that this was wrong. ⁴ ”