Parkin chronicles the plight of many of these “inmates” but never loses sight of the impact of the experience on young Peter. Parkin also shows who tried to assist these refugees and who tried to keep them incarcerated. Drama is built upon what will happen to Peter, the parallel stories which ask if there were collaborators among these men and the impact upon these creative geniuses.

Groundbreaking ... his reportage leads to brilliant, fresh insights ... accomplishing that rare feat of teaching while entertaining, this work ignites a series of debates crucial to the future of video games." ( Library Journal) Simon Parkin’s well-researched and beautifully written book is a testament to how the Jewish refugees interned by the British as ‘enemy aliens’ on the Isle of Man during the Second World War, ‘turned a prison into a university, a camp into a cultural centre’. The camp worked out for Peter, but many others were terrified of falling into Nazi hands when the invasion, which seemed imminent at the time, happened. Being trolled by Nazi sympathizers and fascists daily. There were even “suicide classes” held in secret – just in case.The winner was announced at an event at JW3, featuring the BBC’s Emily Kasriel in conversation with the judges and shortlisted authors. Painstakingly researched from dozens of unpublished first-hand accounts and previously classified documents, The Island of Extraordinary Captives tells, for the first time, the story of history's most astonishing internment camp and of how a group of world-renown artists, musicians and academics came to be seen as 'enemy aliens'.

The Island of Extraordinary Captives, A Painter, A Poet, an Heiress and a Spy in a World War II British Internment Camp by Simon ParkinHe was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.

Just when I thought the US had the market on atrocities committed [ and don't get me wrong, we are 100% in the lead for stupid, horrible things done to other human beings, in the name of protection, when it was really done in the name of hate and superiority and SUPREME IGNORANCE], along comes a book about one of the biggest stains on Britain's history that few know about [ and to be a fly on the wall of some people's houses when this book comes out and they are presented with it] and when people read it, it will be done in horror that people, some of them CHILDREN, were treated in such a way when all they wanted was safety and comfort from the horrors of Nazi Germany. The indignities of isolation from friends and relatives, meagre food rations, wet straw mattresses, lice and inadequate sanitary arrangements led many internees to draw parallels between the mill and the Nazi concentration camps from which they had fled. A former member of the German Foreign Office, held in the mill, claimed conditions were much worse than those of the notorious French prisoner of war reprisal camps he had seen in the first world war, where captured men were kept in cold, brutal conditions and subject to epidemics of typhoid and cholera. According to an official Ministry of Information report, two men, both of whom had previously been incarcerated in Nazi concentration camps, died by suicide. Focusing on one of the many British Internment camps settled on the Isle of Man, Hutchison Camp, the book explores what the catch was. The author worked diligently, giving clear and accessible references to those who desire further information. This camp would eventually hold people who had escaped with the help of British citizens in the Kindertransport rescue efforts (get that? they were being rescued by the British to keep them from the terrors of war!!), bundled together with political prisoners of every stripe, including Nazis. Whether an accusation was true or not was not considered at the start and if it was later done, the process was very late in the game. Peter’s story was no isolated incident. During Hitler’s rise to power in the 1930s, tens of thousands of German and Austrian Jews escaped and found refuge in Britain. Once war broke out in 1939, the nation turned against them, fearing that Nazis had planted spies posing as refugees. Innocent asylum seeker

Table of Contents

In 2021 Canadian PM Justin Trudeau issued a formal apology to the thirty-two thousand Italian Canadians declared ‘enemy aliens’ during the Second World War. While I’m not terribly impressed by apologies after such shameful occurrences, it’s better than nothing. I am not aware of any apology made by the UK or the USA. Walter and Adolf, brothers, were released within a day of one another, and both drawn by Kurt Schwitters in the camp.] Gräf, Hugo. Communist Politician, former member of Reichstag. 11.11.41. Granichstädten, Dr. Emmerich. Scientist. 28.04.41. Greifenhagen, Johann (later 'John’). Architect. 11.12.40 Grünhut, Max Dr., Criminologist. 15.10.40. Oscar Norbert Gugenbichler (a.k.a. Oscar Gugen). Professional Diver, later cofounder of the British Sub-Aqua Club. 28.03.45. Gussefeld, Hans George. Businessman (exhibits letter-openers carved from Prees Heath tent pegs in Second Art Exhibition). 27.05.41. Gutmann, Alfred. Director of Parlophone Records. 29.08.40. Guttmann, Hans Peter. Public Relations officer (laterDirector of Hammond Publishing). 05.10.40. H. Haas-Heye, Otto. Fashion & Textile Designer. 01.05.41. Hallgarten, Fritz. Lawyer & Wine Merchant. 07.12.40. Hamann, Paul. Sculptor. 13.01.41. Hauser, Philo. TV and Film Actor, 07.03.41 Haymann, Prof. Franz Samuel, Professor of Roman and Civil Law. 05.10.40. Heinemann, Prof. Friedrich, Oxford Academic. 18.09.40. Heim, Hans Felix. Student (later: pilot?). 01.08.41. Heller, Georg Bernhard. Artist. 31.08.45. Henning, Paul. Photographer (runs the photography group in camp). 06.12.40. Hepner, Friedrich/ Fritz. Professor of communication history. 7.3.45. Hertel, Gerhard. Artist. 10.04.41. Herz, Peter. Librettist (founder of Camp Cabaret). 8.1.41. Hinrichsen, Klaus Ernst. Art Historian. 18.6.41. Hirsch, Julius. Arts & Crafts Student, 02.09.41. Hirsh, Ulli - see ‘Uri Hirsch’ Hirschenhauser, Rudolf Paul. Portrait Painter, 20.01.41. Holzer, Dr. Paul, Rabbi (leader of Neue Dammtor Synagogue in Hamburg 1923-1938). 23.12.40. Hundert, Chaim. Agent. 02.07.41.