7. The Germans Brought Over 16,000 Slave and Forced Workers
The Germans wanted to build underground bunkers, hospitals, and concrete bunkers on the edges of cliffs, but they needed their men to defend the island, and they could not afford for their soldiers to do back-breaking construction work. So, they imported over 16,000 prisoners of war to do those jobs for them. Most of these laborers were from the Soviet Union.
Slaves from other concentration camps were brought in on ships. They were wearing rags, because they were never given a new change of clothes, and they were skin and bone from nearly starving to death. Even though British citizens could see them working on a daily basis, they were not allowed to give food or help these prisoners, because this was considered a sign of resistance. And the punishment for resistance was either getting shot on the spot, or being deported to a concentration camp. When the war was over, a memorial was erected to remember the lives of the slaves who had been lost on the Channel Islands, even if no one knew the names of these men.