Tumpline NEWS | PROFILE | TRIPS | CANOES | HERITAGE [ CANOES ]
HAND-CARVED CANOES DISCOVERED AT WWII POW CAMP
CAPTIVE CANOEMAKERS
DUG UP DUGOUTS. PHOTOS: ADRIAN MYERS
“Te lake was ours,” wrote Konstantin Schwartz in his diary, recalling the moment he and a comrade paddled out of the reedy shallows and into the gently rippled expanse of Whitewater Lake in the Manitoba wilderness. Many canoeists alone on a secluded lake have probably experienced a similar feeling. Unteroffizier Schwartz and his companion weren’t alone, however, or free. Tey were
German prisoners of war held in a labor camp at Whitewater Lake in the backcountry of the Riding Mountain National Park, southwestern Manitoba, from 1943-45. Most were Afrika Korps captured in Egypt after the Second Battle of El-Alamein in late 1942. Te craft paddled by Schwartz was one of an unknown number of dugout canoes built
by the PoWs in their spare time. Te Germans were free to canoe the isolated lake and occasionally broke away for several hours to visit Ukrainian farmers they’d befriended. Permanent escape was all but a geographical impossibility. Te handcrafted canoes may have been hypothetical getaway vessels, but even if the prisoners paddled and portaged for weeks, they’d still be in the center of an enemy continent. Tis rare canoeing chapter of the Second World War might have been lost if not for
the recent efforts of Stanford University Archeology PhD candidate Adrian Myers. Te Vancouver-born scholar has just wrapped up three years of fieldwork at Whitewater Lake and is currently cataloging and analyzing his findings. His study focus is on the PoW camp as a whole, but the canoes have proved to be a diverting sidelight. Myers and his team uncovered six PoW-built canoes in various states of preservation. “Tis was a labor detachment sent to Riding Mountain National Park for the purpose
of logging. So as the prisoners came across trees that were big enough, they set them aside for recreational use,” says Myers, who has identified the canoemakers’ likely tools: a bow saw, axes, chisels, hammers and knives. Mature fir, spruce, or poplar trees logged from the surrounding forests probably provided the raw material. In addition to the canoes identified in situ and two preserved at Fort Dauphin Mu-
seum, more probably existed. “Te historical documentation mentions a flotilla,” says Myers. “Tey might’ve made 20 or 30.” How did the prisoners know how to make canoes? Tis is a question that Myers is still
looking to answer; he admits that he doesn’t have hard proof but an oral account he came across suggests the presence of a magazine at the camp. “Could someone with no knowledge of boats just carve a canoe? Would it float and go
where you wanted it to go, or not? We looked closely at the canoe in the Fort Dauphin Museum and it’s a sailing canoe with hardware—either someone knew how to do it from before the war, or they had a magazine in the camp with a picture or instructions.” Myers is hoping to unearth a publication from the period to verify the oral account. Until then, German engineering will have to be explanation enough. Ned Morgan is a writer and editor living a short portage away from Georgian Bay, Ontario.
18 EARLY SUMMER 2012
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