As I was driving on my way back from Lake Bala to the holiday cottage I was staying in I noticed a Welsh & Irish flagpole together (which is quite unusual) along with two wreaths at the back of a layby, in the middle of 'nowhere'.
Pulling over and reading the plaques & picture boards there, I found that I had stopped at the site of Frongoch Internment Camp, and 2016 just happens to be the hundredth anniversary of the internment of Irish prisoners at Frongoch
As it is 100 years since this event happened I found out that the local community had organized a number of commemoration events and ensured that the history of the camp has been widely reported.
Below is a bit of history about Frongoch
Frongoch internment camp at Frongoch in Merionethshire, Wales was a makeshift place of imprisonment during the First World War.
Until 1916 it housed German prisoners of war in an abandoned distillery and crude huts, but in the wake of the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin, Ireland, the German prisoners were moved and it was used as a place of internment for approximately 1,800 Irish prisoners, among them such notables as Michael Collins.
They were accorded the status of prisoners of war.
Another of the prisoners was the future Hollywood actor Arthur Shields.
The camp became a fertile seeding ground for the spreading of the revolutionary gospel of the Irish rebels, with inspired organisers such as Michael Collins giving impromptu lessons in guerrilla tactics. Later the camp became known as ollscoil na réabhlóide, the "University of Revolution".
Lord Decies was appointment as Chief Press Censor for Ireland after the Rising in 1916, and he warned the press to be careful about what they published. William O'Brien's Cork Free Press was one of the first papers he suppressed under the Defence of the Realm Act 1914 (DORA regulations) after its republican editor, Frank Gallagher, accused the British authorities of lying about the conditions and situation of republican prisoners at the camp.
The camp was emptied in December 1916 when David Lloyd George replaced H. H. Asquith as Prime Minister.
@lyndamcg Thank you very much-yes it is an interesting story and there's more than i didn't have put in.
What was also interesting was there were a some archaeologists in the field behind excavating the south camp which I went over to view & take photographs - showing the camp stone surfaces & burnt areas where they would have been the turtle stoves.
What was also interesting was there were a some archaeologists in the field behind excavating the south camp which I went over to view & take photographs - showing the camp stone surfaces & burnt areas where they would have been the turtle stoves.