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HALL PLACE NEEDS YOU!
APPEAL FOR STORIES & MEMORABILIA AMERICAN GIs AT
HALL PLACE, BEXLEY IN WWII (1943-45)
Kirsty Macklen, Collections Manager for Bexley Heritage Trust at Hall Place in Bexley,
Kent curates a 6 month exhibition each year at Hall Place for the public using the
Bexley Museum collection. In an exhibition starting this September 2014, she will be
focusing on GIs who were stationed in Bexley as part of the joint Anglo-American
code-breaking exercise known as Operation Ultra, which was centred at Bletchley
Park, but incorporated a traffic intercept station at Hall Place housing some 200 U.S.
GIs.
A U3A Shared Learning Project is currently under way at Hall Place to help Kirsty
gather material for this exhibition. We are so excited to be able to tell the hidden
story of the GIs and their life here. But, we need your help! Sadly, there is very little
physical evidence left of their time there. Kirsty would love to personalise the
exhibition and tell the stories of the men behind the uniform, so we are on the hunt
for any photographs, uniforms, letters, keepsakes from the GIs or their families,
telling us what they did when they were based here.
We are also looking to explore in the exhibition how the GIs integrated with the local
community that lived in the borough. So we are now appealing to local U3As to ask
whether anyone remembers, or knows anyone who remembers, the period 1943-45
when the GIs were stationed here at Hall Place. Perhaps you played softball with the
GIs, or attended local dances? If so, we would love to hear from you.
More of the research
Photo courtesy of Bob Frederickson
Hall Place
