- Roy Courlander
Roy Nicolas Courlander, (6 December 1914-1979), nicknamed 'Reg', was born in
London , the son of Edith Cater (1898-?) and Leonard Henry Courlander (1878-1970), a cinematographer, son of a Lithuanian Jew. Courlander, a former member of theBritish Union of Fascists (BUF), became a member of the infamous GermanWaffen-SS British Free Corps .Early life
Courlander's parents divorced in 1933, after which Roy went to live with his father in the
New Hebrides . In November 1938, Courlander arrived inNew Zealand and found work as a clerk with the Land and Income Tax Department inWellington .Military life
He joined the
New Zealand Army and was captured inGreece in 1941. Courlander posed as a “White Russian émigré” and claimed to have extremeanti-Russian views. He participated in theNazi broadcast into Britain.Subsequently, the Germans recruited Courlander for the British Free Corp. Although the name 'Leonard Courlander' appears in some records in connection with the British Free Corp, the actual member appears to be Roy Courlander. Along with
Thomas Cooper , he is said to have forcibly recruited British andDominion POW s for the British Free Corps.Courlander and another man left the BFC by volunteering for service with the war correspondent unit
SS-Standarte Kurt Eggers , which was operating on the Western Front. Their ultimate goal was to make for the Allied lines at the first chance. Courlander removed all of the BFC insignia from their uniforms, replacing them with the standard SS patches and rank. The two men boarded a train for Brussels in the company of a Flemish Waffen-SS unit. Once there, they turned themselves over to the British, becoming the first two BFC men to return to their homeland.Courlander was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment and was released after 7 years. He died in
Auckland ,New Zealand . in 1970.Further reading
* Weale, Adrian, "Renegades: Hitler's Englishmen." London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1994. ISBN 0-7515-1426-8
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