at Nuremberg and then onto Stalag VII-A at Moosburg in Bavaria. The direction of travel was not consistent. An individual group would sometimes travel in circles and end up at a previous stopping point; it often zig-zagged. Charles Waite describes his route as: Marienburg (Stalag XX-B), Neustettin, Nuebrandenburg, Schwerin, heading for Lübeck but diverting south to Wittenberge, Stendal (after crossing the frozen Elbe), Magdeburg, Halle (just north of Leipzig), Luckenwalde, Belzig, Brandenburg, eastwards towards Potsdam and then in the direction of Berlin. Waite estimated the distance covered as . Comparison of this route with Schirmer's description of the three lines of march may suggest to the reader that his group started on the northern line of march and finished on the central one. According to Nichol and Rennell, the forced march of thousands of western Allied POWs from Stalag Luft VI at Heydekrug beginning in July 1944 was the first of the series of marches known as the Long March. The POWs were marched either to Stalag Luft IV at Gross Tychow (a journey which also involved a 60-hour journey by ship to Swinemünde), or to Stalag XX-A at Thorn in Poland (with part of the distance covered by cattle train). The marches January and February 1945 were among the coldest winter months of the 20th century in Europe, with blizzards and temperatures as low as –25 °C (–13 °F), and even until the middle of March, temperatures were well below 0 °C (32 °F). Most of the POWs were ill-prepared for the evacuation, having suffered years of poor rations and wearing clothing ill-suited to the appalling winter conditions. In most camps, the POWs were broken up in groups of 250 to 300 men and because of the inadequate roads and the flow of battle, not all the prisoners followed the same route. The groups would march 20 to 40 kilometers a day - resting in factories, churches, barns and even in the open. Soon long columns of POWs were wandering over the northern part of Germany with little or nothing in the way of food, clothing, shelter or medical care. Prisoners from different camps had different experiences: sometimes the Germans provided farm wagons for those unable to walk. There seldom were horses available, so teams of POWs pulled the wagons through the snow. Sometimes the guards and prisoners became dependent on each other, other times the guards became increasingly