Seahorse
Grumpy auld mod.
I thought I'd spend a wet and miserable morning having a look to see what might be left of the old POW camp at Stuartfield. I guess I thought I might uncover old wartime artwork on the walls, and such like. In that, I was to be disappointed.
However, my day was much brightened up at a little unexpected discovery. I'll leave that pic to the end.
Stuartfield camp supposedly had a capacity for up to 500 prisoners. Early POWs were Italian, but later prisoners seem to have been 12th Panzer Division guys captured at Caen after D-Day. The prisoners seemed to have been quite popular in the local area, and worked on the farms. Several seem to have stayed behind post war.
After hostilities ended, the camp was used as a displacement camp, and I understand that Hungarians, Bulgarians and the like were housed there. The camp seems to have been still in use up to about 1951, and I suspect that much of the remaining buildings date from this later period, the earlier huts having been demolished. Although several concrete footings still remain. The local farmer still obviously finds the huts very useful for storage.
Anyways, here's a small selection from todays wanderings.
Now used as a chemical store.
Unfortunately, no POW artwork. This had to make do instead.
The remains of this gateway seems a bit fancy
Obligatory agrigultural impliment pic.
I suspect this served as rather more than just a simple water tower. I need to go back when the weather improves, because it looks an interesting climb.
Obligatory chimney shot
These are scattered all over the place.
Just as I was starting to get a bit bored, looky here at what I found!!!
My morning wasn't a total washout after all.
And finally, I couldn't leave without getting a pic of one of the old carts.
However, my day was much brightened up at a little unexpected discovery. I'll leave that pic to the end.
Stuartfield camp supposedly had a capacity for up to 500 prisoners. Early POWs were Italian, but later prisoners seem to have been 12th Panzer Division guys captured at Caen after D-Day. The prisoners seemed to have been quite popular in the local area, and worked on the farms. Several seem to have stayed behind post war.
After hostilities ended, the camp was used as a displacement camp, and I understand that Hungarians, Bulgarians and the like were housed there. The camp seems to have been still in use up to about 1951, and I suspect that much of the remaining buildings date from this later period, the earlier huts having been demolished. Although several concrete footings still remain. The local farmer still obviously finds the huts very useful for storage.
Anyways, here's a small selection from todays wanderings.
Now used as a chemical store.
Unfortunately, no POW artwork. This had to make do instead.
The remains of this gateway seems a bit fancy
Obligatory agrigultural impliment pic.
I suspect this served as rather more than just a simple water tower. I need to go back when the weather improves, because it looks an interesting climb.
Obligatory chimney shot
These are scattered all over the place.
Just as I was starting to get a bit bored, looky here at what I found!!!
My morning wasn't a total washout after all.
And finally, I couldn't leave without getting a pic of one of the old carts.