[West Ender]

I remember some of the German POWs who were at Stanhill camp from when I was about 2 years old. My aunt had a baker's shop in West End and the POWs used to buy bread and pies etc. from her. They had tokens rather than money. They may have been "The Enemy" but to me they were just ordinary people, some of them very nice men.

My father had a German friend who had been a POW (not sure if he was at Stanhill but it's very probable). He had been a Luftwaffe pilot. I remember dad being appalled when this chap said in about 1960 that, if Germany and Britain were to go to war again, he would go home and fight for Germany. I could understand that point of view (I was about 17 at the time) but dad, I suppose, could only equate Germany with Nazism. It was a generational concept.

But what about the Italian POWs who were there before the Germans? They were, largely, repatriated before the end of the war but I knew of several who stayed and married local girls. They seem to be forgotten when the POW situation comes up.

Don't castigate the new pope for his membership of Hitlerjungen. If you were 14 in Germany in the 1930s you either joined or you and your family were targeted for abuse, and much, much worse. I believe he later deserted from the German army, into which he was conscripted, and was captured and imprisoned by the Americans so I doubt if he ever saw Oswaldtwistle. It's a nice thought, though, that he could be celebrating his new appointment in the Vatican - and reminiscing about my auntie's meat and potato pies.