EÒRPA ON BBC ALBA TO MARK ARMISTICE DAY

Wednesday 10 November, 8.30pm on BBC ALBA

Award-winning current affairs series, Eòrpa will bring BBC ALBA viewers a compelling programme marking Armistice Day, as the programme follows the story of German U-boat sailor Karl Heinz Golz who was washed ashore on the Isle of Skye.

On the 23rd March 1945, 17-year old Angus MacPhee was beachcombing with his cousins on the shores of Loch Bracadale, Skye when he made a discovery that would stay with him forever.

On the shore lay the body of a German U-boat sailor, Karl Heinz Golz. Golz had been a machinist on board U-Boat 1003, which had come under attack on 20th March 1945 by Canadian frigate ‘New Glasgow’ off the north-west coast of Ireland. His body was laid to rest in Portree cemetery temporarily and later interred in Cannock Chase, the German military cemetery in Staffordshire.

Many years later the events of that day still affected Angus MacPhee. Wanting to find out more about the young man whose body he had found on the shore, BBC Scotland contacted the local paper in the home town of Karl Heinz Golz asking for family members and friends to get in touch. It transpired that nobody in his family knew Karl Heinz had been found and buried in the UK.

A team from Eòrpa visited the town of Neumünster in northern Germany to find out more about Karl Heinz Golz, and to speak to his great niece, Jessica Lucht. Jessica then accompanied the Eòrpa team to Scotland to meet Angus MacPhee and to see the place where he made his discovery, as well as travelling to Cannock Chase to the grave where Karl Heinz Golz was finally laid to rest.

Jessica Lucht said: “As far as I knew he had just died in the sea off Scotland and he had not been found. And there was an anonymous grave where apparently fallen German soldiers were buried. But no one ever told us explicitly that that was where Heinz Golz was. And it was difficult to find these anonymous graves because no one had the money then to travel to them. It was great that someone was interested in it, in our family history, and that there was a person who had found him. That was what struck me most at that point. And the thing I wanted most at that point was to get to know this person, who had been so big-hearted to have concerned himself with this.”

Angus MacPhee said: “This man has been on my mind all my life. It gave me a huge lift to find out who he was and that he had relatives alive today. It's done me the world of good to meet one of his relatives. It’s like closure. I'm so glad that Jessica will now see his grave and she too will have closure.”

This programme follows the story of Karl Heinz Golz and the discoveries made by Angus MacPhee and by Jessica Lucht as they embark upon their fact finding missions.

Produced by BBC Gàidhlig, Eòrpa will broadcast on BBC ALBA on Wednesday 10 November at 8.30pm and weekly thereafter. The programme will also be broadcast on Friday 12 November at 7.30pm on BBC 2 Scotland and available on BBC iPlayer.