Weekend of events to remember Foxley camp

Nature has reclaimed the grounds of former Foxley Manor, where Canadian and American soldiers were once billeted, and when peace came the site went on to become a refuge for Polish families displaced by the conflict.

The last vestiges of those busy years will soon disappear as the area is returned to parkland. This weekend the life and times of Foxley Camp will be remembered in a two-day celebration on the former site and in Mansel Lacy.

Foxley Remembered this Saturday and Sunday will roll back the years with an exhibition of photographs, documents and oral history of the camp from 1939 up until 1963 and an in-depth study carried out by Whitecross School in Hereford entitled Shared Freedom – Shared Future.

Foxley Manor, and a swathe of parkland, was requisitioned for the war effort and the First Battalion, 2nd Canadian Pioneers moved in. Later it was to become a staging camp for American troops awaiting D-Day.

Here were two US hospitals, receiving soldiers injured in combat on the Continent, and in this sylvan setting an inscribed plaque recalls those feverish times.

After the war, Foxley was to become home to demobbed Polish servicemen and their families, unable to return home after the annexation of their country to Russia. It also served a vital need for many Herefordshire people suffering from the post-war housing shortage.

With support from the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Mansel Lacy Community Fund has embarked upon an ongoing project to bring together the history and heritage of Foxley Camp.

Today Mansel Lacy, a village without pub or shop, excels in community spirit. The decision to stage this special weekend has effectively lit a spark; memories, and memorabilia, have come flooding in. Foxley Remembered promises two days charged with emotion. On Saturday, military and vintage vehicles will rumble once more up the main concrete road to the old camp, and on Sunday the Archdeacon of Hereford, the Ven Derek Chedzey will lead a church service on site.

The thrust for the event came about as part of Mansel Lacy’s efforts to raise money for the village church. While a few traces of Foxley Camp have remained, roads and hard-standing where homes once stood, the area is to be returned to parkland.

Landowner Jamie Davenport gave permission for Whitecross School to delve into Foxley’s past, and for the Foxley Remembered event. Says Sue Hallett, who has been collating photographs and documents for the exhibition: “The problem was that there won’t be anything to see so it was decided to gather some written memories.

“Even the children of the soldiers who were stationed there are older and children of the demobbed Polish service people are starting to thin out a bit.”

Foxley once had its own school. “Between 1952 and 1958 the school became huge and by all accounts it was a really nice school with a massive playground! Children had so much freedom.” Buses regularly plied between Hereford and Foxley.

However, there were few luxuries. A shower block at the top end of the camp, installed by the soldiers during wartime, was available for the hardier residents, or it was a tin bath by the fire.

There was a half-mile trek to the public lavatories too. “There were no inside toilets until Herefordshire County Council took over in 1951,” says Sue.

The converted huts were built with breeze blocks, though the Canadians brought ship-loads of timber with them to construct the early camp. Two of these were carefully transported over the Welsh border where they continue to serve as Presteigne Memorial Hall.

“In 1943 the camp was extended to US units and two hospitals were built,” says Sue.

“I find the whole thing fascinating, and we’re finding that more and more information is coming through. Everyone is being really generous,” she explains. “We hope that people will be able to look back and see what the Foxley story was.

“It’s important that we have this connection with the past.”