Author’s Note
Prologue
‘Are you from the castle?’
Chapter 1: ‘The young generation of a great people’
1933–39: The Jews, the Nazis and Abergele
Chapter 2: ‘A field in the middle of nowhere’
Summer 1939: The gathering of the Gwrych refugees
Chapter 3: ‘On a dark night’
30 August–6 September 1939: Arrival at Gwrych Castle
Chapter 4: ‘I wanted to do something useful’
September 1939 (Part 1): Establishing the Gwrych Hachshara
Chapter 5: ‘We had good plans’
September 1939 (Part 2): Developing the Gwrych Hachshara
Chapter 6: ‘I didn’t tell them I was German’
October–November 1939: Aliens, football
and meeting the neighbours
Chapter 7: ‘An old bowler hat’
December 1939–February 1940: Blackouts, winter
and The Wizard of Oz
Chapter 8: ‘Leck mich am arsch’
March–April 1940: Learning Welsh, fancy dress,
the ‘naughty’ boys and girls, and a car crash
Chapter 9: ‘A very traumatic experience’
May–June 1940: Spy fever and internment
Chapter 10: ‘I couldn’t see any purpose to it’
July–September 1940: Departures, arrivals and divisions
Chapter 11: ‘Not quite the haven they anticipated’
October 1940–September 1941: Bombs, weddings
and the closing down of the Gwrych Hachshara
Epilogue
‘This place gave us a new life’
Appendix I: Nominal roll of those known to
have been at Gwrych Castle between 1939 and 1941
Appendix II: Glossary
Acknowledgements
Notes
Sources and Bibliography
Index
