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Grizedale Hall was a large country house at Grizedale, Hawkshead, in the Lake District in Cumbria, England. After two earlier Grizedale Halls had preceded, it was built anew in 1905 in the style of Gothic Revival architecture. During World War II it became No 1 Prisoner-of-war camp to hold German officers and was finally pulled down in 1957.
The Grizedale estate had been acquired by the Rawlinson family in 1614 who kept it for some generations and it is assumed that the old Grizedale Hall had been built around that time. In the mid-eighteenth century Richard Ford came into possession of part of the Grizedale estate, though probably not of the hall itself, which by that time had become a farmhouse, known as the Grizedale Hall Farm. In the 1800s the old hall was demolished and a new farm house was built on its site which exists today under the name Grizedale Home Farm.
In approximately 1745 Richard Ford built a new home in Grizedale known as Ford Lodge situated 250 yards east of the old hall. His great-grandson Montague Ainslie who inherited Grizedale estate in the early nineteenth century turned his family's country cottage into a larger residence in 1841, which became known as Grizedale New Hall. It was pulled down around 1904 to make way for a large country house.
In 1903 Harold Brocklebank, a wealthy Liverpool based merchant and shipping magnate bought Grizedale estate. He was born in 1853, being the third son of Sir Thomas Brocklebank, 1st Baronet. After the old hall was pulled down, Harold Brocklebank completely rebuilt Grizedale Hall in 1905, the interior design having been completed by 1907. The architects of the new stone-built 40-room mansion in neo-gothic style were Walker, Carter & Walker of Windermere, Cumbria. Brocklebank inhabited Grizedale Hall with his wife Mary Ellen Brogden, three daughters and two sons until his death in 1936, when the hall and the 4,500 acre estate were taken up by the Forestry Commission. After serving as the first prisoner-of-war camp in the United Kingdom from 1939 to 1946, the hall stood empty. Due to its high maintenance costs the Forestry Commission auctioned off the fittings, fireplaces and staircases and demolished the hall in 1957, leaving only the single-storey adjoining building with storage rooms on the east side of the hall as well as the garden terrace. For several years the grounds were used as a campsite by the Camping and Caravanning Club. Some architectural remains of the hall like the walls and stairs of the massive garden terrace and the close with its gates can still be seen today, the car-park of the Grizedale Forest visitor centre being placed on top of the internal side of the former house.
During World War II Grizedale Hall was commandeered by the War Office and became officially known as No 1 POW Camp (Officers) Grizedale Hall since 1939, to hold the most elite of German P.O.W.'s. As many of the prisoners were rescued survivors from sunken U-boats, it also became known as the "U-Boat Hotel". A well-known prisoner was Otto Kretschmer, Germany's most successful U-boat captain until his capture.
The camp incorporated watchtowers, a double perimeter fence that encircled the house and around thirty huts. Together these could hold around 300 prisoners. The camp also had a kitchen garden, a football pitch and a library containing German-language books. [1] The fighter pilot Franz Baron von Werra was initially held there and made a famous escape attempt in late 1940, inspiring the story of the 1957 film The One That Got Away , Grizedale Hall serving as the film site just shortly before its destruction. Other known prisoners were rear-admiral Hans Voss, SS-general Maximilian von Herff, General Wilhelm Ritter von Thoma and U-boat commander Werner Lott. The camp was emptied in 1946 of all remaining prisoners to be repatriated to Germany and Austria. The POW camp Grizedale Hall also inspired the 1970 war drama film The McKenzie Break and is site of the 1989 thriller A Cage of Eagles by James Follet. Italian PoWs were also housed here, some carrying out gardening and other jobs in the local area.
A new building for the Grizedale Forest visitor centre called "The Yan" (Cumbrian for One) was built in 2008 in extension of the remaining annex to the former hall, a construction of timber and natural stone, designed by Sutherland Hussey Architects of Edinburgh and opened on 23 June 2008 by Lord Clark of Windermere.
The Lake District, also known as the Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region and national park in Cumbria, North West England. It is famous for its landscape, including its lakes, coast, and the Cumbrian mountains; and for its literary associations with Beatrix Potter, John Ruskin, and the Lake Poets.
Ambleside is a town and former civil parish in the Westmorland and Furness district of Cumbria, England. Within the boundaries of the historic county of Westmorland and located in the Lake District National Park, the town sits at the head of Windermere, England's largest natural lake. In 2020 it had an estimated population of 2596.
Alston is a town in Westmorland and Furness, Cumbria, England, within the civil parish of Alston Moor on the River South Tyne. It shares the title of the 'highest market town in England', at about 1,000 feet (300 m) above sea level, with Buxton, Derbyshire. Despite its altitude, the town is easily accessible via the many roads which link the town to Weardale, Teesdale, and towns in Cumbria such as Penrith via Hartside Pass, as well as Tynedale. Historically part of Cumberland, Alston lies within the North Pennines, a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Much of the town centre is a designated Conservation Area which includes several listed buildings.
Franz Xaver Freiherr von Werra was a German World War II fighter pilot and flying ace who was shot down over Britain and captured. He was the only Axis prisoner of war to escape from Canadian custody and return to Germany apart from a U-boat seaman, Walter Kurt Reich, said to have jumped from a Polish troopship into the St. Lawrence River in July 1940. Werra managed to return to Germany via the US, Mexico, South America and Spain, finally reaching Germany on 18 April 1941.
The One That Got Away is a 1957 British biographical war film starring Hardy Krüger and featuring Michael Goodliffe, Jack Gwillim and Alec McCowen. The film was directed by Roy Ward Baker with a screenplay written by Howard Clewes, based on the 1956 book of the same name by Kendal Burt and James Leasor.
Bowness-on-Windermere is a town and former civil parish, now in the parish of Windermere and Bowness, in the Westmorland and Furness district, in the ceremonial county of Cumbria, England. It lies next to Windermere lake and the town of Windermere to the north east and within the Lake District National Park. The town was historically part of the county of Westmorland and it also forms an urban area with Windermere. The town had a population of 3,814 in the 2011 Census.
Coniston is a village and civil parish in the Westmorland and Furness district of Cumbria, England. In the 2001 census the parish had a population of 1,058, decreasing at the 2011 census to 928. Within the boundaries of the historic county of Lancashire, it is in the southern part of the Lake District National Park, between Coniston Water, the third longest lake in the Lake District, and Coniston Old Man.
Eden Camp Modern History Museum is a large Second World War-related museum near Malton in North Yorkshire in England.
Fell Foot Park is a country park situated at the southern end of Windermere in Cumbria, the largest lake in England. It is north of Newby Bridge in the civil parish of Staveley-in-Cartmel, in South Lakeland district.
Stalag VIII-B was a German Army prisoner-of-war camp during World War II, later renumbered Stalag-344, located near the village of Lamsdorf in Silesia. The camp initially occupied barracks built to house British and French prisoners in World War I. At this same location there had been a prisoner camp during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71.
Grizedale Forest is a 24.47 km2 area of woodland in the Lake District of North West England, located to the east of Coniston Water and to the south of Hawkshead. It is made up of a number of hills, small tarns and the settlements of Grizedale and Satterthwaite. It is owned and managed by Forestry England and is a popular tourist destination with waymarked footpaths, mountain biking, an aerial assault course, a 16-bed hostel, and a visitor centre with a children's playground, education centre, café and shop. The car-parking of Grizedale Forest Visitors Centre is situated on the site of the former Grizedale Hall where its remains can be still seen.
Wray Castle is a Victorian neo-gothic building at Claife in Cumbria within the boundaries of the historic county of Lancashire. The house and grounds have belonged to the National Trust since 1929, with the house open to the public on a regular basis since 2013. The grounds, which include part of the shoreline of Windermere, are open all year round and are renowned for their selection of specimen trees – Wellingtonia, redwood, Ginkgo biloba, weeping lime and varieties of beech.
Grizedale is a hamlet in the Lake District of North West England, in the middle of the Grizedale Forest, located north of Satterthwaite and south of Hawkshead. It is part of the civil parish of Satterthwaite.
Camp Ruston was one of the largest prisoner-of-war camps in the United States during World War II, with 4,315 prisoners at its peak in October 1943. Camp Ruston served as the "base camp" and had 8 smaller work branch camps associated to it. Camp Ruston included three large, separated compounds for POWs, a full, modern hospital compound, and a compound for the American personnel. One of the POW compounds, located in the far northwestern part of the camp was designated for POW officers. The officer's compound's barracks were constructed to house a lesser number of POWs affording more privacy and room for the officers. The enlisted men's barracks were designed to house a maximum of 50 POWs in two rows of bunks that ran along each side. POW latrines were separate buildings located at the end of each compound.
Werner Lott was a German U-boat commander in World War II. He was taken prisoner on 29 November 1939 after his boat was scuttled in the North Sea at position 60°53′N2°47′E after having been depth-charged by HMS Kingston, HMS Kashmir and HMS Icarus.
Kuremaa is a small borough in Jõgeva Parish, Jõgeva County in eastern Estonia. It lies 10 km from Jõgeva, near the northern shore of Lake Kuremaa, the 11th largest lake in Estonia. Kuremaa features an estate that was owned by the von Oettingen family until the early 20th century. Part of the estate's manor house is now a museum, its windmill in neighbouring Mooritsa village is a popular landmark, and its terraced gardens reach down to the shore of Lake Kuremaa.
Great Wratting is a village and civil parish in England, about four miles from Haverhill, Suffolk, in the valley of the River Stour. There is a ford across the Stour in the centre of the village, where bathing and fishing are common pursuits. The river here is heavily populated by crayfish, a non native species long since escaped from farms near the mouth of the Stour.
Heinz Schnabel and Harry Wappler were two Second World War German prisoners of war who escaped from a British prison camp and attempted to fly to the continent in a stolen aircraft on 24 November 1941.
Large numbers of German prisoners of war were held in Britain between the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939 and late 1948. Their numbers reached a peak of around 400,000 in 1946, and then began to fall when repatriation began. The experiences of these prisoners differed in certain important respects from those of captured German servicemen held by other nations. The treatment of the captives, though strict, was generally humane, and fewer prisoners died in British captivity than in other countries. The British government also introduced a programme of re-education, which was intended to demonstrate to the POWs the evils of the Nazi regime, while promoting the advantages of democracy. Some 25,000 German prisoners remained in the United Kingdom voluntarily after being released from prisoner of war status.