POW camp 30 - Bowmanville, Ontario (Urban decay shots with 7-14)

sabesh · #1 May 15th, 2010, 09:14 PM

Bowmnaville, Camp 30 (WW-II POW camp)

These buildings, now derelict, housed about 800 high ranking German officers who served during the 2nd world war. Some notable POWs (Prisoners of war):

Korvettenkapitan, Otto Kretschmer - Most successful submarine commander of WW-II.
General, Johann von Ravenstein - second-in-command to Field Marshal Erwin Rommel (Afrika Korps).

More info here:

Camp 30, Bowmanville, History

For entire set with larger images, click here:

Camp 30, Bowmanville, Flickr set

Recreation room:

Swimming pool:

Cafeteria:

Library:

Basketball court:

Streetshooter · #2 May 15th, 2010, 09:17 PM

Good job, you captured the scenes very well...
shooter

Bokeh Diem · #3 May 15th, 2010, 09:36 PM

I can hear the voices, some plaintive, some still grasping at hollow authority, ringing off those walls. The place is a graveyard for all those tyrannical ideals that infected the minds of proud men, all of them bit actors in a much larger play.

Thank you for the shared work.

Bokeh Diem

sabesh · #4 May 16th, 2010, 09:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Streetshooter

Good job, you captured the scenes very well...
shooter

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bokeh Diem

I can hear the voices, some plaintive, some still grasping at hollow authority, ringing off those walls. The place is a graveyard for all those tyrannical ideals that infected the minds of proud men, all of them bit actors in a much larger play.

Thank you for the shared work.

Bokeh Diem

I'm glad that you'all enjoyed the shots! Cheers.

cosinaphile · #5 May 16th, 2010, 09:31 AM

haunting as good urban decay is .... i hear the echoes from here

sabesh · #6 May 21st, 2010, 05:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cosinaphile

haunting as good urban decay is .... i hear the echoes from here

Being a history buff with an interest in WWII, this outing was special for me. Cheers.

squeegee · #7 May 21st, 2010, 05:19 PM

Nice photos / presentations of the "rooms". What gets me is the amenities that POW's got here...

A swimming pool?
Library?
Basketball court?

They were much more generous than I would be if I were the one designing a prison for people trying to kill me.

sabesh · #8 May 21st, 2010, 08:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by squeegee

Nice photos / presentations of the "rooms". What gets me is the amenities that POW's got here...

A swimming pool?
Library?
Basketball court?

They were much more generous than I would be if I were the one designing a prison for people trying to kill me.

I hear ya. It appeared more like a country club. I was surprised to see that. I guess they treated the officers (prisoners) with comfort. Cheers.

Streetshooter · #9 May 22nd, 2010, 04:52 AM

I didn't want to mention this in my 1st post. Squeegee made a good point about conditions. I've seen much worse, so much so that I wouldn't post the images.

Sabesh, I guess it's fairly obvious that this is an issue I am involved in.
I would like to know if I could show some of these to some members of a few organizations I work with? There would be no copyright issues at all, it would be just so that a few key people could see the conditions here at this camp.

Let me know...thanks Shooter

sabesh · #10 May 22nd, 2010, 08:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Streetshooter

I didn't want to mention this in my 1st post. Squeegee made a good point about conditions. I've seen much worse, so much so that I wouldn't post the images.

Sabesh, I guess it's fairly obvious that this is an issue I am involved in.
I would like to know if I could show some of these to some members of a few organizations I work with? There would be no copyright issues at all, it would be just so that a few key people could see the conditions here at this camp.

Let me know...thanks Shooter

Shooter, no worries, you can show these to them. A point to be aware of: This camp wasn't specifically built as a POW camp. It's a compound that had been a delinquent boys school prior to the war. Excerpt from the Wiki:

Bowmanville, Ontario - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Quote:

Camp 30, the Lake Ontario Officers' Camp-Bowmanville, held captive German army officers from the Afrika Korps, fliers from the Luftwaffe and naval officers from the Kriegsmarine. Farms surrounded the camp that had been a delinquent boys' school prior to the war. In several accounts by former POWs, the prison was represented as very humane, in that the prisoners were well treated and well fed.

Among the German officers transferred from England to Bowmanville was Korvettenkapitän Otto Kretschmer, who was the top U-boat ace of World War II. Kretschmer assumed the duties of the senior naval officer, sharing the command with the senior Luftwaffe officer Oberstleutnant Hans Hefele and the senior army officer General Leutnant Hans von Ravenstein.

The Bowmanville boys' school had been quickly turned into a POW camp by surrounding the existing school buildings with a barbed wire fence. The facility, which had been designed to house 300 boys, was cramped and undersized for grown men. Two twelve-foot high fences with electric lights every twelve feet and nine guard towers surrounded the 14-acre (57,000 m2) site. The fence had sixty miles of barbed wire looped around the small perimeter. Lieutenant Colonel R.O. Bull M.C. had a support staff plus the Veterans Guard of Canada, consisting of nine officers and 239 other ranks under his command to guard the prisoners.

When the naval prisoners arrived at Bowmanville, there were no recreational facilities. The naval officers quickly transformed the camp. Flower and vegetable gardens were planted, sports fields, tennis courts and a swimming pool were built. The quarters were expanded, giving the prisoners better living conditions. The prisoners received money from home or earned extra money by manufacturing wooden furniture. They were able to purchase beer, cigarettes and dry goods from Eaton's mail order catalogue. It was an ideal life except that there were no women and no freedom. For some there was the urge to get back to the war and defend their country, and for others a desire to remain POWs for the duration of the war.

A daily routine of exercise, sporting events and work assignments was established. As well as English being taught, professors from the nearby University of Toronto gave lectures for university credit classes. A school was also formed, which taught midshipmen seamanship and navigation courses.

Current movies were shown each week. National and religious holidays were observed, and music concerts were given regularly. Elaborate stage plays were produced. Extraordinary puppets were designed and fabricated for puppet shows. Although the conditions were good in the Canadian POW camps, there was very little to do, and the routine was always the same.