Huthwaite War Memorial

I was called up into the army in 1941 and my first posting overseas was to Algiers. From there to Malta, where we took part in the landings on Sicily July 10th 1943. Arriving back in the UK in 1944, to then take part in the D Day landings in Normandy, and then on to Germany until VE Day.

  In 1946 I was sent home to the UK to a P.O.W. Camp which was situated at Common Road, Huthwaite, I think almost opposite a coal mine. I spent about six months there and was very happy.

  I made friends with some people living in that road and was invited by one family for a cup of tea on more than one occasion, the name I cannot remember after all these years. The man of the house was a coal miner and we often went to a pub called the Miners Arms. These were times of great shortages and they often ran out of beer and sometimes not enough glasses to go round, so some were left drinking out of jam jars. We got our newspapers from a shop at the top of Common Road, the owner was I think a Mr. Jones.

  The Huthwaite camp was a detachment from our main camp situated at The Hayes, Swanwick, Derbyshire. We had about fifty PoW's, whom we sent out each morning to work on farms in the area. I often took prisoners to a radio shop on the road to Sutton-in-Ashfield, and they would carry back batteries and accumulators for our radios. They were only allowed out under escort, and they were all Germans.

  All prisoners were German ex-soldiers, but gave very little trouble to the guards. We only had to threaten them with a return to The Hayes to bring them into line. They wore army battledress, which was dyed brown with a red circle on the back of the tunic and a patch on the trouser knee. Very distinctive indeed.

  The camp was enclosed with barbed wire, with a large gate almost opposite the Pit Road. The gate was manned all and every night. The camp huts were all wooden construction, I think six in total. One large one in two sections, one end being the cookhouse and the other end the prisoners dining area. There were nine soldiers to look after them, and our hut was the last one at the bottom of the camp (nearest the gate.)

  We were all well fed, a typical days menu would be:- porridge for breakfast; very little for lunch as the camp would be empty; plenty of bread and sometimes cake and individual fruit pies. The main evening meal would consist of canned stew or corned beef, of which there was plenty, and all prepared by German cooks. We had no M.O. (medical officer) and in case of sickness the Prisoners of War were taken to the surgery at Huthwaite to be treated. The soldiers reported there also.

Determined efforts are being made in his locality to provide European voluntary workers, who are employed on the land, in factories and mines in the area, with recreational facilities and social contacts.
  Considerable progress in this direction has been made since Mr. F. J. Wield became warden of the Notts. War Agricultural Executive Committee's hostel on Common Road, Huthwaite. Before Mr. Wield came to Huthwaite there was in existence a mixed choir consisting of agricultural workers from the Huthwaite hostel, miners from the Mansfield district, and girls employed at Mansfield factories, with Mr. J. Marchewka, the assistant warden at the Huthwaite hostel, as conductor.

  The whole of the choir, which also includes a group of dancers, are Ukrainians, and recently gave a concert at St. Michael's Church Hall, Sutton. Ambitious plans are on foot to bring into being a concert party covering the whole of Nottinghamshire. It is expected that between 300 and 400 of these workers will be available to form a choir, which there are **** instrumentalists and dancers, ..., under the Chairman of Mr. F. Cookman, Mansfield, Labour Supervisor. S, Mary Church, Mansfield, run a class, the benefit of these workers, while at Huthwaite recreational facilities are available at the hostel, and the workers also use the Huthwaite Church Youth Club premises one evening each week.

  English classes have been provided at the Huthwaite and Sutton Evening Institutes, under Mr. Johnson and Mr. A. Hatfield respectively, while Mr. Wield and Mr. Marchewka also provide instruction in the English language on two evenings at the hostel. The Sutton class has unfortunately had to be terminated.
  When interviewed by a representative of the "Free Press," Mr. Wield stressed that the whole idea behind his work at Huthwaite was to bring the workers into social contact with English people. The Ukrainians had had a hard time, said Mr. Wield. During the German occupation they had to leave their own country to work for the Germans, and now they could not go back as the Russians claimed they had helped the Germans. They were waiting for the day when the Russians left the Ukraine or were driven out.
  Mr. Wield said there were one or two people in Sutton who invited residents of the hostel into their homes occasionally. He would like to see more of that kind of thing, and repudiated strongly the idea which some people seemed to have, that the European voluntary workers were of the same standard as Germans and Italians.
  All the residents of the Huthwaite camp are employed on the land, and are absent from 6.30 in the morning to 6.30 in the evening.

  Mr. Wield paid tribute to the help he had received from the Sutton W.V.S.- "They have a very capable person in Miss Miller; she is one of the best," he said - Mr. Johnson, Mr. Hatfield, Mr. Street of the Huthwaite Church Club, and the Nottingham Branch of the British Red Cross Society.
  Stressing that his main object was to get the men to mix socially with local residents, Mr. Wield remarked that the bigger proportion of them would become naturalised Englishmen. If local people would mix with them, it would be a big help in teaching the men the English language and about English government and laws, of which many of them knew nothing.