James Fulthorpe

James Fulthorpe

From: Alan Bailey

Date: 20 February 2016 at 13:13

Subject: Re: Prisoner of War

To: Lamsdorf

FROM MY BOOK.

Many people over the years have asked me, "what was the major highlight of your career?" The most incredible episode doesn't involve my day to day operations at 208, - well loosely, perhaps. In my early years there, the discs we were playing were 78 rpm shellac and the 45’s were just starting. Our record library was on the top floor and the weight of all these discs caused problems on the structure of the building. Every so often we used to have a purge and many of the 78’s that rarely got airplay were smashed or 'skipped.' I used to sift through them to collect little gems like pristine copies of Paul Robeson and Nellie Lutcher rarely played on request programmes for my own collection. Among these, were about five Nazi discs that were played for propaganda purposes from Luxembourg during World War Two. They consisted mainly of German announcers and English collaborators broadcasting their slant on how the war was going. At some stage after the war they were obviously shipped back to London. Among these little gems I rescued was an interview with an English prisoner of war who was a Submariner and was allowed to send a message to his wife and four and a half year old son in Looe, Cornwall. This was in March 1944 and his name was James Fulthorpe. On the recording it sounded like Woodthorpe or Woolthorpe. I wondered if I should try to contact them. For all I knew the Germans may have let him record the interview to show what nice people they were then put a bullet in his head. Eventually after much soul searching and many years I tried to track the family down to present them with a copy, not knowing if James survived the war. But I had the wrong name. After 30 or so years of research, in 2004 I managed to locate the family. James came safely home but unfortunately died in 1975 ago from natural causes. However the family were very pleased to have a copy of the disc. I have now donated that disc to the Royal Navy Submarine Museum in Gosport, Hampshire. I must mention at this stage that George Malcolmson of the museum was very helpful in providing information on James, his submarine, Navy record and an amazingly detailed account of how his submarine 'H.M.S Sahib' was depth charged and eventually sunk by the Italian Navy. I have also passed these notes on to the family. James Fulthorpe received the D.S.M for valour and heroism, so James wherever you are "I salute you."

BBC programme with John Peel