Milag Nord Prisoner of War Camp

Tommy's Log was first published in Jan. 2004. Since then, we have received dozens of e-mails from friends and relatives of survivors. Many have sent photos and stories and the "About this Site" page has a list of those we have published. Where a comment relates to an individual photo or page in the log, I have added the photo there. Readers of this site contributed to the 60th Anniversary plaque put up at the camp site in Germany on April 28, 2005. If you have photos, comments or stories you would like to send, please do so, we will publish all we can.

Other Prisoners and Stories George Shaker - SS AD Huff Reg Urwin - SS Empire Gilbert Ernie Shakleton- AD Huff Lewis McMahon - SS Lusterous John Kendall - SS Nowshera "Seaboots" Munroe - SS AD Huff Fred Hutson - SS AD Huff Andrew Drews - SS Carlton Ropner Memorial

 

Tachus (Tom or Tommy) Constantine McNamee was born in Jamaica about 1898.  Very little is known about his early years or his family.  We know that he had a number of brothers and sisters, but he only kept in touch with one brother Easter who lived in New York city. Tommy spent most of his life as a merchant seaman, moving to Halifax, Nova Scotia about 1920.   Tommy had lied about his age to join the Merchant Navy during WWI.

In February of 1941 Tommy was a fireman aboard a British owned ship SS Kantara. Details of the Kantara's crew can be seen by clicking here. Two German battleships, the Scharnhorst and the Gneisenau were loose in the Atlantic hunting Allied shipping. About 500 miles West of Newfoundland a westbound convoy scattered hoping to escape. On February 22nd at 10:55am the two ships sank the Kantara after allowing her crew to abandon her. The Kantara was able to warn other ships, but for some it was too late.  In all the Germans sank 5 ships from one convoy that day.  Eleven allied crewmen died and 180 were taken prisoner. Click on the map to see a larger version. ( Thanks to John Asmussen for permission to use his drawing from the Scharnhorst web site and to Roger Griffths for copies of crew documents from the British Archives.)

Tommy was to spend the rest of the war in German POW camps, mainly at Marlag und Milag Nord, a camp that held Naval (Marlag) and Merchant (Milag) seamen. In mid 1943 Canadian POWs received a logbook from the Canadian government. Tommy kept writings, drawings and photos in his logbook. Clicking on the logbook will bring up a web page with the contents of the book.

Tommy returned to Halifax after the war.  He married Elsie Hollett and they had two children, Shirley and Graham. Tommy continued to work as a merchant seaman and as a cook on ocean going tugs. In the 1960s he became a taxi driver in Halifax.