Peter Conder - Second World War

Second World War

As war approached, Conder joined the Territorial Army, and was commissioned into the 2nd London Regiment, Royal Corps of Signals. When the British Expeditionary Force was sent to France (with World War I weapons) in 1939, he was deployed with the Royal Ulster Rifles, the Coldstream and the Grenadier Guards near Lille. On 12 June 1940 he was captured by the Germans at Saint-Valery-en-Caux, France, with the 51st (Highland) Infantry Division. They were marched through France, Belgium, Holland and Germany to Laufen on the German-Austrian border. Conder later wrote, "When I was captured I lost thirty thousand words. Two years’ work".