Dannevirke's John Lamason with Denise Diatkin, nee Kalmanson, who sheltered bomber pilot Phil Lamason in 1944 in France, before his arrest by the Gestapo. Photo / Supplied
Dannevirke's John Lamason with Denise Diatkin, nee Kalmanson, who sheltered bomber pilot Phil Lamason in 1944 in France, before his arrest by the Gestapo. Photo / Supplied
On a cool morning in September 2014, a small car rolls to a halt on the cobbled Caracho Rd leading into Buchenwald Concentration Camp.
In the car are Dannevirke's John Lamason, his wife Debbie and family friends Ngaire Hansen and Glenys Scott.
Children playing on Phil Lamason's downed Lancaster bomber. Francois Ydier, who played on Phil's crashed plane as a child and became an Air France pilot.
They have come to Germany to follow the journey taken by John's father, Squadron Leader Phil Lamason, who found himself caught up in a wartime drama in World War II.
Buchenwald was the infamous place where more than 54,000 political, religious and other prisoners lost their lives in a starvation, work and death regime. The camp had no gas chambers, only brutal, merciless killings and "no way out except as smoke through the chimney".
Dannevirke's Phil Lamason in his Lancaster bomber before a mission over Germany during World War II.
This is where a young Phil Lamason, just 25 years of age, began a vigorous campaign to get release for himself and 167 other RAF airmen who were betrayed into this hell hole of humanity.
With great bravery and indomitable leadership, Phil demanded Geneva Convention rights as POWs and constantly insisted that his men would not work for the Nazis.
John and Debbie Lamason, dwarfed by the Buchenwald tribute statue.
Considered terror fliers and spies, the RAF men were condemned to death, neglected, starved and systematically beaten. However, Phil insisted his men maintain military discipline and organised the men into 17 groups that irritated the Kapo guards and Nazi officers in charge. Much of the focus was on Phil as the leader and he faced a firing squad and scare tactics as they tried to shake his resolve, but Phil never stepped back and secured a miraculous liberation of his men when he made contact with the Luftwaffe who protested their treatment.
Leaving Palmerston North Airport for their trip, Debbie and John Lamason and Glenys Scott.
They were sent to Stalag Luft 3 Camp where the Great Escape had been carried out previously.
Also high on the list for the Lamasons' emotional trip to France was the visit to the 91-year-old French resistance lady who harboured Phil in her family home in the summer of 1944. Denise Diatkin, nee Kalmanson, was the daughter of a French Jewish family who hid people needing to escape to Spain, via the Comet Line, or across the Channel to England.
It was a historic moment when John and Denise met on the stairs of her 300-year-old apartment in Notre Dame, Paris, on what would have been Phil's 96th birthday.
The guard tower and torture cells at Buchenwald Concentration Camp, as they stand today.
She recalled how exciting it was to host the men who they saw as liberating France from Germany. They were very fond of Phil and his navigator "Chappie" - Ken Chapman from England, who stayed for three recuperative weeks.
Another group with a vested interest were the children from Plaisir, just out of Paris where Phil was shot down. They played on the planes that had crashed and one, Francois Yider, went on to become an Air France pilot, while his friends designed the new A380 in service today.
The Lamasons and their friends laid wreaths at the graves of two of Phil's crew who lost their lives. Five survived. Buchenwald was liberated on April 11, 1945, by the Sixth Armored Division of the US Third Army led by General George Paton.
