A Different Wartime Story – Week 37 of the Oswestry Heritage Comics
The heritage that runs through families is often very complicated. It mixes together the personal and the individual with national and the international; family history often intersects with global events in unexpected ways. Sometimes, stories only come together later on in life, when suddenly events and people “click” into place.
When the Oswestry Heritage Roadshow was running during Heritage Open Days last summer, we met a lot of people with really interesting family history stories. One in particular stood out: Diana Baur’s story about her grandfather’s experiences during World War I. Her grandfather was German, and lived and worked in Britain as a UK citizen. But during the dark days of WWI, it was thought that anyone who had any kind of foreign connections might be in some way dangerous. So hundreds of British citizens were rounded up and transported to huge camps across the country. Families were separated – men and women herded into different camps. These camps were often isolated, in rural and outlying parts of the country. Shropshire had its share: Park Hall and Prees Heath were at various times used as internment camps, often directing internees on to other camps further away. One such distant camp was Knockaloe, on the Isle of Man, and this was where Diana’s grandfather was sent. It was a terrible time, and Diana’s grandfather suffered like all the rest of the inmates – separated from their families, crowded together, treated like prisoners. Eventually, as the war came to an end, the camps were disbanded – and Diana’s grandfather returned home with his family, including to his son – Henry: Diana’s father.
Years later, when Diana was working as a school-teacher in Oswestry and living near Llanrhaeadr, Henry moved up to be closer to her. He became a well-known and popular figure in the villages around – as much for his accordion playing as for his stories and German drinking songs! He used to go to various Day Centres during the week – to meet people, to sing, to play his accordion. On one visit, he fell into conversation with a man called Martin Appledorn, who also had a German background – and before long, they began to exchange stories about their childhoods, and the experience of growing up during World War I. “My father spent the war on the Isle of Man,” Henry said. Martin, surprised, said: “That’s funny – so did my father!” Henry shook his head sadly, “He was in Knockaloe Camp – as an internee.” “Oh,” Martin said. “So did my father – but as a guard…”
Both Henry and Martin’s families were German, both had Fathers who had brought their families to the UK to become British citizens – yet while Henry’s German father was locked up in Knockaloe Camp, Martin’s German father was his guard. Henry might have been forgiven for becoming bitter about how unfair and arbitrary his Father’s detention had been – but instead, he and Martin became firm friends, grateful that they had this chance to bring their two family stories together – and far more interested in the things they had in common than the things which made their families different: something perhaps the British authorities in WWI should have paid more attention to!
The Oswestry Heritage Roadshow will be continuing to tour around the region, interested in hearing about your family history stories and looking for innovative ways to record and memorialise them. Our next scheduled event is May 21st at the meeting of the Llanymynech History Society, at the Presbyterian Church Hall, 7:30pm. I’ll be giving a talk about the Oswestry Heritage Comics, and we’ll have interview sheets and questionnaires for anyone who has a heritage story to tell. See you then!
john g. swogger 