Growing Up Fast: An ordinary manâ s extraordinary life in occupied Jersey

Foreword by John Nettles I was involved in the making of a TV documentary on the German Occupation of the Channel Islands. Naturally, I wanted to talk to anyone who had been in Jersey during that time and who might be considered an authority on the subject. Whenever and whoever we asked about this, one name always came up: Bob Le Sueur, who was, we were told, without doubt one of the most important voices of the Occupation still living. Robert Winter Le Sueur was working as a young (and handsome) insurance clerk when the German soldiers of 216th Infantry Division came marching into St Helier on that hot July day in 1940, the first day of the Occupation. And he was still working at his job in May 1945 when the islands were liberated. He was lucky to be alive, for during those five years of occupation, Robert, or Bob as he was and is popularly known, had taken it upon himself, in the name of common decency, to provide help and find refuge for many wretched victims of German oppression and cruelty. There was one man in particular that Bob helped: he was called Feodor Polycarpovitch Burriy, known as ‘Bill’ because, Bob told us, the good people of St Ouen, in which parish he was first hidden, had great difficulty in pronouncing any one of his three Russian names. Had Bob been caught helping a Russian slave-worker, he might have been imprisoned, transported to a concentration camp or even shot but, despite this, he persisted in helping Bill and as many fugitives from vicious German captivity as was within his power. Riding about the island on his rickety bicycle with lengths of hosepipe replacing proper tyres, Bob marshalled his helpers, organised safe houses and kept a kindly and caring eye on all involved in the perilous enterprise. Bob spoke of many of his experiences during the Occupation. As he spoke it became abundantly clear that here was a man who knew and felt more about the Occupation and its effect on his fellow islanders than could ever be adequately captured in any documentary. He had befriended kind- hearted Louisa Gould, who was to meet a tragic end in the Nazi labour camp of Ravensbrück. He had worked with the would-be revolutionary, Norman Le Brocq, and encountered the stern local bureaucrat, Clifford Orange—Bob knew all the major players in the Occupation drama. This gentle and softly-spoken Jerseyman had seen it all. ‘What,’ I asked him, ‘is the most important thing to say about those years of occupation?’ ‘People,’ Bob replied after a pause. ‘People you’ve known well, or thought you knew well, when faced with difficult circumstances, the naturally kind, good-hearted people can become saintly, while those with a mean streak in them become—I must be careful of the word I am using here—well, just what they are.’ It can be said without fear of contradiction that Bob himself belongs to that first category of good-hearted people. Now it is true that Bob has not been canonised, but he was, after an unconscionable time, awarded the MBE. Who has deserved it more? And who could have given a better personal account of the experience of occupation in that most terrible of wars, than appears in Growing Up Fast? It is, of course, hugely well informed in all the domestic and political aspects of the Occupation. The traumas, the terrors, all the humour, the unexpected laughter, all the sadness and the tears of those years are here in the pages of what is a beautiful book about an extraordinary time: the reminiscences and observations of a remarkable man, Robert Winter Le Sueur, MBE. It is truly a privilege and a pleasure to have met him. John Nettles May 2020