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| Above: My great uncle, John Paton (seated), in Ruhleben, 1916, shortly after his internment. |
In 1914, thousands of British civilians and merchant seamen, along
with foreigners from other nationalities with British connections, were interned at the hastily constructed prisoner of war
camp at Ruhleben racecourse by Spandau, near Berlin, Germany. Most would not see freedom from the camp until the end
of the war, but managed to create and maintain a unique way of life for the four years of their unwelcome internment.
This site was constructed to try and tell the stories of as many
of those civilians as possible, and to act as a memorial for those who found themselves as the unwitting victims of circumstance,
caught up in a struggle that should never have happened.
Sources trawled for information on the inmates include Ruhleben based
websites on the internet, printed publications, the National Archives catalogue in London, issues of the Ruhleben Camp Magazine,
sales on E-bay of Ruhleben related memorabilia, and many, many more.
25 MAR 2008
UPDATE: If you have anything that might help further the story of the Ruhleben POW camp, I would be extremely
pleased to hear from you! Please contact me at my new e-mail address of christopherpaton@tiscali.co.uk (please note that the previous e-mail address of chrispaton@btinternet.com is now defunct)
 NEWS UPDATE
January 1st 2008
It's been a long time coming, but I have finally done the huge update to this site that I
have been promising for the last six months, adding over 250 names in the last week and updating the entries for
many others. This now takes the total to over 1700, almost a third of all those interned in the camp, and I would like to
offer a huge thank you to everybody who has contributed so far - please keep it coming!
Matthew Stibbe's long awaited book "British Civilian Internees in
Germany: The Ruhleben Camp, 1914-1918" is due to be published by Manchester University Press on May 1st 2008. The hardback
edition of this book, which will feature this site, can be pre-ordered through Amazon.co.uk at a price of £55, and the
paperback edition for £14.24, through the following links:
Secondly, I have now digitised the complete run of "In Ruhleben Camp" and "La Vie Francaise
de Ruhleben", which are now available for sale on CD through the shop link on the left hand side of the page.
Finally, I now work as a full time professional genealogist in Scotland, with very reasonable
rates (!), and am happy to help anybody with Scottish family history needs and problems. My website at www.scotlandsgreateststory.co.uk outlines the services that I can provide.
I look forward to hearing from you, and helping in any way I can!
Chris
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| The racecourse at Ruhleben, home to five and a half thousand civilian POWS in the First World War. |
This site currently contains the names
of approximately 1743 out of 5500 prisoners who were interned at Ruhleben.
Please use the links on the top left hand side of this page to navigate your way
around the site.
Last updated Jan 4th 2008
Scottish family history research service.
Bring your ancestry back to life!
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