Our speaker on 4th July was Cathy Jones whose talk was entitled “Khaki and Camisoles” which turned out to be about life in the Isle of Man during both world wars.

The British government used the island to intern aliens in holiday camps, hotels and additional hutted camps as well as requisitioning B & B accommodation on the seafront in Douglas.

In WW2 4,000 women and 350 children were also interned but at the seaside villages of Port St. Mary and Port Erin under much less stringent conditions.

The island was also used for much military training and airfields were built for the RAF. The Royal Signal Corps was used for code breaking, the results being transmitted to Bletchley Park.

Cathy finished by relating the story of a Manx friend who enlisted in the RAF in WW2, flew in a Lancaster and was shot down over France.

She related how he was sheltered by the Resistance for a year and evaded capture. Belatedly he was awarded the Légion d’Honneur.

Yet again we had a speaker who enlarged our knowledge on a subject probably few of us knew much about.

We meet at 10:00 every Thursday at The Boathouse, Evesham Rowing Club.

On July 18th our member Chris Donough will enlighten us on “The Psychology of Probus”.

Full details can be found on our website www.eveshamprobus.co.uk Alan Smith