BOOKS, films and TV documentaries give us an arresting insight into the absolute horrors and carnage of the trenches, but not so widely appreciated is that some of our troops were taken prisoner during the First World War.

And many of them were victims of inhuman treatment and cruelty at the hands of their captors, much along the lines of those harrowing PoW stories from the Japanese camps of the Second World War.

Thanks to typed notes in my own family's archives, I am able to recount here, the suffering endured by four young Worcester soldiers captured in 1918.

Only two of them survived the experience. They were my late uncle, Hubert Grundy of Bath Road, and E Evans of Chestnut Walk, who were interviewed by the Worcestershire Echo in 1919.

The typed notes are of the local newspaper article which was later read out at the London trial of an infamous German camp commandant, Captain Mueller, who was charged with gross ill-treatment of British prisoners of war.

The two ill-fated members of the Worcester quartet of PoWs were Harold Price, in civilian life a booking clerk at Foregate Street Station, who died in captivity, and Edward Bradley of the well-known Diglis Island waterways family, who died shortly after returning home.

All four were privates serving in the trenches with the 6th Somerset Regiment, and they were taken prisoner on March 21, 1918, when overwhelming German forces overran the Allies near Amiens.

"We were marched three days and three nights behind German lines and without food. All we had were drinks from buckets of water," my uncle told the Echo reporter in 1919.

"Eventually were arrived at a ration dump where we had our first bite of food - a 4lb loaf, divided among 15 of us.

"Bradley was then pretty well and was ordered to carry a German soldier's pack. Evans, though having a gunshot wound in the side, had to march with the rest.

"We finally reached Flave de Martel PoW camp where the commandant was the notorious Captain Mueller. There were only three huts for more than 1,000 men, so many of us had to sleep in the open. All we were left with by way of clothing were shirts and trousers. Everything else including boots and under-clothing had been taken off us."

For the next six weeks, the PoWs had to lay railways, build roads and load shells on to lorries "even though we knew these were going to be used against our comrades in the line.

"At the end of the day we had to parade in two rows and stand there for about two hours with Capt Mueller riding on horseback up and down the lines. Some of the men, being weak and having had no food, would occasionally falter, and Mueller would immediately notice this and strike men on the side of the head with his fist or a stick. One day he broke a chap's jaw in this way."

Meagre daily rations consisted of pickled or boiled cabbage and a few ounces of bread More than 160 PoWs died at Flave during May 1918, alone, mostly from dysentery.

Among the victims was Harold Price of Worcester.

"He had been working with me loading rails but one fell on his foot and injured his ankle. He was brought back to the hut for a couple of days but, though he was not fit, he was forced back on to road mending.

"Dysentery came on, and I took him back to the hut and put him on a wire bed - one of those in tiers. There was a dead man above him. He knew it and was very sensitive. He was there for a couple of days and then taken to what was called a hospital, but it had no medicine, no doctor and only paper bandages.

"Harold only lasted a week, and when we buried him, he was a skeleton - through his stomach we could see his backbone."

All the PoWs were being "half-starved" and would scavenge potato peelings thrown out by the Germans, together with grass and stinging nettles from the grounds.

"I had two handsome pocket wallets which I was glad to part with for a piece of bread," said Hubert Grundy. "Ted Bradley gave his gold watch to a German officer for a loaf and 12 cigarettes."

The prisoners were refused water for washing and had long beards as they could not shave. Most men were afflicted with lice.

Later, in 1918, as the Allies began to repel the Germans, the prisoners were transported in open trucks to Stendal in Germany - a journey taking them three days and three nights with no food, and there were several more deaths among the prisoners.

Misfortune then began to hit Ted Bradley who developed "terribly bad feet and legs with septic sores the size of half crowns and smothered in lice. Even so, he was still forced to work laying rail tracks but made some sandbags to go round his swollen feet.

"Poor Ted got so weak he could not pick up his shovel so he was given so-called 'light duty' carrying drinking water to the men. Eventually he was put in hospital at Stendal because he was so ill."

The prisoners were finally freed by the Allies on Boxing Day 1918 and returned home, though Ted Bradley never regained his health and died a few weeks later.

My late father, Ted Grundy, often told me that Hubert, his twin brother, had been dreadfully thin and a nervous wreck when he arrived home after his time as a PoW.

My father had also fought in the First World War but was wounded at Passchendaele and sent back to England for hospital treatment.

My uncle Hubert was an accomplished horseman, riding for many years from Fred Tustin's stables at The Butts. His working life of many years was spent in administration at the Air Ministry in Whittington Road, Worcester. He died in 1963, at the age of 67.

Alas, I cannot fill in the final tantalising facts to the story of the four Worcester PoWs because the typed notes left by my uncle do not include details of the fate of Captain Mueller from his London trial, though it seems very likely he would have been sentenced to death.

n Top left, the late Hubert Grundy.

n Top right, a scene reminding us of the horrors of the First World War.