Edward Armand Le Put

By Gilly Carr

Edward Armand Le Put was born in St Helier, Jersey, on 27 January 1924, the eldest of four children. His father was French and his mother was Jersey-born. We do not know much about his early life, but his mother died in 1935 when he was just 11 years old. At the time of the registration of Islanders in 1940, Le Put was single and worked as a hotel employee. However, he married Vivienne Jacklin on 6 July 1943 when he was only 19 years old.

Le Put first comes to our attention because, on 10 June 1944, he was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment for two cases of receiving stolen articles. Documents in his newly uncovered personal camp logbook, held by Jersey Archives, indicate that he left the Island on 30 June 1944, the same date as the letter from the Attorney General to the Constable of St Helier requesting that details of the conviction of Edward and three other men are ‘inscribed in the local Police Records’.

A fragmentary piece of paper, held together with yellowed sellotape in Le Put’s camp logbook, shows that he had been held in a number of places before he reached his final destination. Although the full narrative is hard to read and some words are now illegible, we can make out something of his journey through Europe.  He notes that he left Jersey on 30 June 1944, arriving in St Malo probably the following day. He spent a week in St Servan prison in St Malo, before being sent for 27 days to Camp Margueritte, which was part of Jacques-Cartier Prison in Rennes. On 7 July 1944 it was bombed and shelled, according to Le Put. This accords with what we know about three other Channel Islanders who were almost certainly deported with Le Put: Harold Le Druillenec, Louisa Gould, and Berthe Pitolet, as well as Thomas Daly, with whom Le Put was sentenced. Berthe famously escaped during the bombing but the others did not. On 3 August 1944, Le Put seems to have started on a long train journey, where each of the stops across France are recorded in his logbook. Thomas Daly escaped on this journey, but the others did not. On 15 August 1944 Le Put arrived at Belfort, but we do not know whether he entered Fort Hatry prison here with Le Druillenec or whether this was a merely a railway stop on his journey. Because we know that Harold Le Druillenec was in Belfort for ten days, we can probably assume that Le Put was here too. However, as Le Put’s notes end at this point, we must also assume that, just as Le Druillenec left Belfort to go to Neuengamme concentration camp on 1 September 1944, this was likely the date at which Le Put entered the nearby Giromagny Internment Camp. He was extremely lucky, and we can only assume that the severity of their original offences and length of sentences separated the two men’s fate.

A document in The National Archives states that Le Put’s wife had not heard from him since the beginning of 1944, which suggests that he may have been put in Jersey prison a long time before he was charged (or else his wife’s memory was inaccurate). Enquiries were made at Marlag and Milag Nord Camp for Le Put (who by then was in barrack 19, room 6 of this camp), and his name appears on a nominal roll from the camp of those who arrived from Giromagny Internment Camp in September 1944. The nominal roll dates from 8 December 1944.

A newspaper cutting shown on this web page from the Guernsey Star dated 19 June 1945, recording the names of Islanders returned to the UK from prison sentences, shows Edward Le Put’s name. Le Put had actually arrived in Scotland, where he stayed in the Displaced Persons camp in Bridge of Weir.

There are oddities in the original records in Jersey about Le Put. His name is absent from the political prisoner log book, and the date of his deportation is not stated, which is worrying. How many other islanders were deported from the island without any record? Were the other four men sentenced with Le Put, who all received sentences of more than three months (usually the shortest sentence which made people eligible for deportation) also deported? We know that Thomas Daly was. The families of Timothy Donoghue, Arthur Charles Tubby and Ernest Stanley Wozencroft (Le Put’s brother in law) are encouraged, along with the family of Edward Armand Le Put, to get in touch with the Frank Falla Archive.

At some point after the war, Edward moved to England, with his name appearing on several electoral registers in the Liverpool area from the mid-1950s, along with his wife Vivienne and their two children George Albert and Ann. Edward Le Put died in Lowton, Warrington in July 1988.

Sources

Edward Le Put’s occupation registration card, Jersey Archives ref D/S/A/4/A9805.

Edward Le Put’s occupation registration form, Jersey Archives ref. D/S/A/4/B9805.

Edward Le Put’s charge sheet, copyright Jersey Archives ref. D/Z/H6/7/99.

Edward Le Put’s camp logbook, Jersey Archives ref. L/F/831/1.

Guernsey Star, 19 June 1945.

The National Archives ref. FO 916/113

Liverpool Record Office; Liverpool, England; Liverpool Electoral registers, Burgess rolls and Voters Lists; Reference: Hq324.241LIV [Available on Ancestry]

England and Wales, National Probate Calendar (Index of Wills and Administrations), 1858-1995 [Available on Ancestry]