Was watching a documentary earlier on this absorbing and interesting subject and thought I would post something here for others, as after a search I couldn't find another reference to it. - BBC Alba documentary Remarkable WWI story of HMS Timbertown HMS TIMBERTOWN - Internment of British sailors of the Isle of Lewis in Holland during the Great War HMS Timbertown TD
Very interesting, never heard of this before. Internment of British sailor/soldiers of the Royal Naval Division in Groningen during the First World War Tim
Am just passing through the forum at the moment, so haven't watched the clips yet (but looking forward to it). It strikes me Holland was in a real bind in WW1, though: they feared the slightest deviation from strict neutrality might well bring Germany over the border. My grandfather was an Old Contemptible, captured at Le Cateau; like a number of long-term POWs he was transferred into internment in Holland in January 1918, but in fact also went hungry there, though not as badly as in the German camps. The British government refused to provide additional rations, saying British servicemen should not eat better than the Dutch themselves; and for their part the Dutch, blockaded by the Allies and threatened by the Germans, could hardly be seen to favour interned British POWs. Something of a balancing act! I can't claim any deeper knowledge - my grandfather apparently never mentioned the war (or the brothers he lost in it), apart from to remember being extremely hungry; well, and to claim - rather implausibly we all thought - that he was taken prisoner by a German bloke on an 'orse wiv a lance. Which turned out to be the truth, as it happens. Cheers, Pat.
