London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Friday, Oct 31, 2025

Secrets of Nazi concentration camps in Britain revealed for the first time

Secrets of Nazi concentration camps in Britain revealed for the first time

Official documents revealing the horrors of the only Nazi concentration camps in the UK, on the island of Alderney, can be seen for the first time

Official documents revealing the horrors of the only Nazi concentration camps to have existed on British soil can be seen in public for the first time.

Thousands of French Jews, Russian prisoners of war and German political prisoners were interned on the tiny Channel island of Alderney between 1942 and 1945.

The secret Pantcheff report, compiled 75 years ago, is supposed to be locked up in British archives until 2045 but a copy was given to Russia from where it has now emerged.

It reveals that Britain investigated the atrocities after the war - but later refused to bring any prosecutions fearing an international embarrassment.

The post-war Government also appears to have failed to help other countries seeking to do so.

German soldiers arriving in Southampton from the Channel Island of Alderney in 1945


Lord Pickles, the UK’s special envoy for post-Holocaust issues, said that people deserved to know why Britain failed to prosecute a single Nazi for war crimes committed there.

The Tory former cabinet minister said: “What happened does not reflect well on the British government at the time, and we are eager to ensure the full facts are understood by the nation.

“That is why I am saying we must release all documents related to the Holocaust that are currently classified by next January.”

The grim details of the dossier detailing systematic violence and murder on the island were first revealed by ITV earlier this month, with more details released by the Sunday Times.

Thousands of French Jews, Russian prisoners of war and German political prisoners were interned on Alderney


The classified report written by British intelligence officer Major Theodore Pantcheff, then 24, shows what he found after a series of interviews on Alderney at the end of the war.

The young officer, fluent in French and German, spoke with more than 3,000 witnesses, including former prisoners of war, German soldiers and civilians.

They described Jews and Russians being beaten or murdered for pleasure, prisoners eating rotting food, rubbish and snails, and, in one case, the suggestion of cannibalism.

Pantcheff also included an account of the torture of a Russian teenager who was made to sit on a hot stove for 30 minutes.

The Channel Islands were occupied on June 15, 1940


He concluded: “It has been established, I think, that crimes of a systematically brutal and callous nature were committed - on British soil - in the last three years.”

The Channel Islands were occupied on June 15, 1940, after Winston Churchill decided they were of little strategic importance and could be left undefended.

The Nazis had defeated the Allies in France just days before, forcing the French to surrender and the British off the continent.

Nazis outside a bank in Alderney


Churchill avoided mentioning the islands in his broadcasts, believing the thought of Nazis walking past red postboxes and English roadsigns could damage morale.

Four months later, Hitler announced his plan to create an “impregnable fortress” on the islands at the heart of his Atlantic Wall to prevent an allied invasion of Europe.

Alderney, whose residents had already been relocated, was to become one of the most heavily fortified sections and Nazi military engineers arrived shortly after.

Former Tory minister Lord Pickles


They oversaw the construction of four labour camps, starting in 1941, as well as other satellite prisons for slave labourers.

In 1943, the SS arrived, turning two of them into concentration camps.

It is thought that more than 6,000 people of 27 nationalities were taken to the island.

Many arrived in cramped conditions on boats with less than one square metre deck space per man and no sanitary facilities on board.

Some died during transit to or from the island, or while docked in the harbour for days waiting to get out.

Josef Kaiser, a German naval officer, recalled 14 dead bodies being removed after a ship waited in harbour for five days with one body “eaten by rats or Russians”.

Prisoners lived in wooden barracks, many damp, flooded and structurally unsound, encircled by barbed wire fences.

They spent most of their time outside doing at least 12 hours of heavy labour a day, with a short break at midday, for seven days a week.

They had no special equipment and wore the same clothes year-round, with the exception of wooden clogs.

The inmates lived on starvation diets, with “half a litre of coffee, without milk or sugar” for breakfast, “half a litre of thin cabbage soup” for lunch, and “a similar portion of soup and a 1 kilo loaf among 5-6 men” for dinner.

Unsurprisingly, many of the men were soon broken, scavenging for food among scraps left by dogs and dead animals buried under manure.

Ernest Vincent Clark, a British farmer who remained on the island, described a regular parade of sick prisoners brutally assaulted by camp guards, including being kicked in the kidneys.

Senior Nazi officials were also responsible for horrific crimes with Karl Theiss, a commander, requiring his office walls to be repainted four times to remove bloodstains.

Scharführer Hoeglow, the head of the SS troops, is listed as giving a 4 days’ leave, extra food and drink to SS guards for every five dead prisoners.

One Nazi medical orderly, Scharführer Krellmann, gave elderly and incapacitated prisoners lethal injections which killed them within five minutes.

On other occasions, individual prisoners said to have been thrown into the sea for not working hard enough.

Pantcheff concluded that at least 372 inmates were killed but the true figure is likely to be much higher, with contemporary historians estimating a death toll between 700 and 950.

A number of witnesses referred to burial pits with up to 10 bodies in each, and the graves left open until they were full.

The British officer’s report contained a long list of named Nazi officials, crimes they were accused of, and details of underlying evidence.

It also provided evidence of the camp’s leadership structure and its role within the wider Nazi war machine, reporting to Heinrich Himmler, the main architect of the Holocaust.

Yet Britain did not bring prosecutions and prevented others from doing by failing to disclose evidence.

As a result, only a handful of Germans were ever punished for their crimes on Alderney, mostly by a French military tribunal.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Shawbrook IPO Marks London’s Biggest UK Listing in Two Years
UK Government Split Over Backing Brazil’s $125 Billion Tropical Forest Fund Ahead of COP30
J.K. Rowling Condemns Glamour UK Feature of Nine Trans Women as 'Men Better at Being Women'
King Charles III Removes Prince Andrew’s Titles and Orders His Departure from Royal Lodge
UK Finance Minister Reeves Releases Email Correspondence to Clarify Rental-Licence Breach
UK and Vietnam Sign Landmark Migration Deal to Fast-Track Returns of Irregular Arrivals
UK Drug-Pricing Overhaul Essential for Life-Sciences Ambition, Says GSK Chief
Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie Temporarily Leave the UK Amid Their Parents’ Royal Fallout
UK Weighs Early End to Oil and Gas Windfall Tax as Reeves Seeks Investment Commitments
UK Retail Inflation Slows as Shop Prices Fall for First Time Since Spring
Next Raises Full-Year Profit Guidance After Strong Third-Quarter Performance
Reform UK’s Lee Anderson Admits to 'Gaming' Benefits System While Advocating Crackdown
United States and South Korea Conclude Major Trade Accord Worth $350 Billion
Hurricane Melissa Strikes Cuba After Devastating Jamaica With Record Winds
Vice President Vance to Headline Turning Point USA Campus Event at Ole Miss
U.S. Targets Maritime Narco-Routes While Border Pressure to Mexico Remains Limited
Bill Gates at 70: “I Have a Real Fear of Artificial Intelligence – and Also Regret”
Elon Musk Unveils Grokipedia: An AI-Driven Alternative to Wikipedia
Saudi Arabia Unveils Vision for First-Ever "Sky Stadium" Suspended Over Desert Floor
Amazon Announces 14 000 Corporate Job Cuts as AI Investment Accelerates
UK Shop Prices Fall for First Time Since March, Food Leads the Decline
London Stock Exchange Group ADR (LNSTY) Earns Zacks Rank #1 Upgrade on Rising Earnings Outlook
Soap legend Tony Adams, long-time star of Crossroads, dies at 84
Rachel Reeves Signals Tax Increases Ahead of November Budget Amid £20-50 Billion Fiscal Gap
NatWest Past Gains of 314% Spotlight Opportunity — But Some Key Risks Remain
UK Launches ‘Golden Age’ of Nuclear with £38 Billion Sizewell C Approval
UK Announces £1.08 Billion Budget for Offshore Wind Auction to Boost 2030 Capacity
UK Seeks Steel Alliance with EU and US to Counter China’s Over-Capacity
UK Struggles to Balance China as Both Strategic Threat and Valued Trading Partner
Argentina’s Markets Surge as Milei’s Party Secures Major Win
British Journalist Sami Hamdi Detained by U.S. Authorities After Visa Revocation Amid Israel-Gaza Commentary
King Charles Unveils UK’s First LGBT+ Armed Forces Memorial at National Memorial Arboretum
At ninety-two and re-elected: Paul Biya secures eighth term in Cameroon amid unrest
Racist Incidents Against UK Nurses Surge by 55%
UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves Cites Shared Concerns With Trump Administration as Foundation for Early US-UK Trade Deal
Essentra plc: A Closer Look at a UK ‘Penny Stock’ Opportunity Amid Market Weakness
U.S. and China Near Deal to Avert Rare-Earth Export Controls Ahead of Trump-Xi Summit
Justin time: Justin Herbert Shields Madison Beer with Impressive Reflex at Lakers Game
Russia’s President Putin Declares Burevestnik Nuclear Cruise Missile Ready for Deployment
Giuffre’s Memoir Alleges Maxwell Claimed Sexual Act with Clooney
House Republicans Move to Strip NYC Mayoral Front-Runner Zohran Mamdani of U.S. Citizenship
Record-High Spoiled Ballots Signal Voter Discontent in Ireland’s 2025 Presidential Election
Philippines’ Taal Volcano Erupts Overnight with 2.4 km Ash Plume
Albania’s Virtual AI 'Minister' Diella Set to 'Birth' Eighty-Three Digital Assistants for MPs
Tesla Unveils Vision for Optimus V3 as ‘Biggest Product of All Time’, Including Surgical Capabilities
Francis Ford Coppola Auctions Luxury Watches After Self-Financed Film Flop
Convicted Sex Offender Mistakenly Freed by UK Prison Service Arrested in London
United States and China Begin Constructive Trade Negotiations Ahead of Trump–Xi Summit
U.S. Treasury Sanctions Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro over Drug-Trafficking Allegations
Miss USA Crowns Nebraska’s Audrey Eckert Amid Leadership Overhaul
×