Polish Resettlement Corps (PRC)

​​When, in July 1945, the British government withdrew recognition of the Polish Government in London to recognise the Warsaw regime imposed by Russia and refused Polish forces a place in the Victory parade, it found itself with a very tricky problem  –  what to do with a large allied army, air force and navy owing its allegiance to, and under the control of, a government no longer recognised by the British and actively hostile to the government now proclaimed by Britain and the USA as the legitimate government of Poland?

One of the options was to repatriate the Polish armed forces and their dependents forcibly to Poland but, as it is succinctly put in a cabinet briefing paper “… it needs to be born in mind that the Polish army is currently the largest fighting force in Italy.” The problem was solved in a pragmatic and very British way. A Polish Resettlement Corps (PRC) was raised in 1946 by the British government, as a corps of the British Army, into which Poles were enlisted for the period of their demobilisation – which would be completed by 1949.

Some 150,000 chose to remain in Britain and were joined later by their families and dependents from wherever the fortunes of war had left them, swelling the numbers to well over 200,000. The only way such numbers of men and their families could be accommodated was by placing them in camps recently vacated by the Americans and Canadians. Some 265 camps were occupied by the PRC; most were built in the early 1940s in rural areas, often in the grounds of large country estates, as Military Hospitals, Army Bases and Airfields. There were also a small number of short-lived temporary camps under canvas.

Members of the PRC were enlisted for a period of two years but all were registered with local labour exchanges (job centres) as available for work, to be demobilised in regional PRC Administration and Payroll centres as soon as they found employment. The main centre was in Witley Camp in Surrey and people often wonder why this camp is mentioned even though they never actually lived there. This stamp is their demobilisation stamp.

The PRC was a uniformed but unarmed formation, with the specific task of preparing its members for civilian life in Britain and training them to work in sectors of the British economy that were suffering from a shortage of manpower, such as mining, construction, heavy industry and agriculture. It operated under British law and was subject to King’s Regulations but retained its Polish military organisational structure and was commanded by Polish officers.

In practice, there were a number of obstacles to taking up civilian work. Industrial areas short of manpower were often also short of living accommodation. The National Service Hostels Corporation (NSHC) often helped in these cases by setting up hostels for single working men but these were very primitive and quite unsuitable for families. Trade unions were jealously protecting skilled jobs and in many cases would not recognise vocational training provided in the PRC, and so only the most menial work could be offered to the Poles. Many labour exchanges operated a semi-official policy of jobs for British workers first, and so personal contact became a major source of job opportunities. Companies that had employed Poles and found them to be hard-working and reliable would encourage them to spread the word among their Polish friends that there was work to be had and this led to Polish communities being established in these areas.

The PRC completed its mission and was disbanded in 1949.

POLISH 2nd CORPS UNITS ASSIGNED TO RESETTLEMENT CAMPS IN THE UK
The War Office formed a plan for the dispersal of Polish displaced persons upon their arrival in Britain from Italy. Soldiers were to be distributed across the various Commands in Britain… the exception being Scotland. Most of 1st Corps were based there and it was felt that a further influx of Poles would antagonize the local population. Even so, 4,640 were sent there regardless. Where the Poles ended up and eventually settled largely depended on luck and to which unit they belonged. Initially they were housed in vacated barracks (often US or Canadian) before being demobilised into the Polish Resettlement Corps.

Civilians were allocated to hostels, schools and resettlement camps.
There was only marginal migration from these first settlement areas and most of that happened when sufficient accommodation and work became available. Certainly, the big cities drew many and they became visible communities, but there remained a huge, widely dispersed Polish community in rural Britain.

Polish 2nd Corps Units Assigned to Resettlement Camps in the UK

SCOTTISH COMMAND			EASTERN COMMAND
Base Troops			HQ 3rd Infantry Division
HQ Artillery Group			3rd Infantry Division
Berwickshire	1930		HQ 14th Armoured Brigade
Roxburghshire	1880		14th Armoured Brigade
Berwickshire	830		Buckinghamshire	4,970
	4640		Hertfordshire	860
			Huntingdonshire	200
NORTHERN COMMAND			Norfolk	12,850
HQ 2nd Armd Division			Suffolk	650
2nd Armoured Division			Sussex	3,760
Derbyshire	580			23,290
Lincolnshire	5730
Northumberland	5080		WESTERN COMMAND
Yorkshire	4780		HQ 2 Polcorps & Base Troops
	16,170		Anglesey	3,560
			Brecon	1,450
SOUTHERN COMMAND			Cheshire	1,330
HQ 5th Inf Div. (5KDP)			Cumberland	26,850
5th Infantry Division			Derby	840
Berkshire	1,200		Glamorgan	1,850
Gloucestershire	4,720		Hereford	7,260
Oxfordshire	3,530		Lancashire	6,790
Wiltshire	6540		Merioneth	490
	15,990		Montgomeryshire	1,730
			Pembroke	2,060
			Shropshire	1,240
			Stafford	5,100
			Yorkshire	170
TOTAL TROOPS: 120,810				60,720
[Public Records Office FO371 56388 N8991]

List of Resettlement Camps in the UK

	Name of Camp / Hostel / School	County in UK	Years of Operation	Year Closed
1	Ashby Folville Camp	Leicestershire		1956/1957
2	Babdown Camp	Gloucestershire	1948-1959	1959
3	Blackshaw Moor Camp	Staffordshire	1947-1961	1961
4	Bower Wood Camp	Beaconsfield Buckinghamshire
5	Breighton Airfield Camp	North Yorkshire
6	Burlington Crossing Camp	Stourport
7	Carr Lane Camp	Hull
8	Checkendon Camp	Berkshire	1948-1961	1961
9	Daglingworth Camp	Gloucestershire
10	Damfield Lane / Maghull Camp	Liverpool Transit camp
11	Delamere Park Camp	Northwich	1949-1963	1963
12	Diddington Park School	Huntingdonshire
13	Doddington Camp	Cheshire (near Crewe)		1960/1961
14	East Moor Camp	Yorkshire	1948/9-1959	1959
15	Elsham Wolds Camp	Lincolnshire	1948 to 1953	1953
16	Fairford Camp	Gloucestershire		by 1959
17	Foxley Camp	Herefordshire		1955
18	Great Missenden Woodlands Park Camp	Buckinghamshire		1956
19	Grove Park Camp	Buckinghamshire, (near Iver),		1957
20	Hallburn Hostel	Cumbria (near Longtown)	1947-1953/54	by 1954
21	Hardwick Park Camp	Chesterfield	1947-1955	1955
22	Haydon Park Camp	Somerset		1955/1956
23	Hazlemere Camp	Buckinghamshire (near High Wycombe)	1948-1955/56	1955/1956
24	Hiltingbury Camp	Hampshire (near Southampton)	1946-1956/57	1956/1957
25	Hodgemoor Camp	Buckinghamshire (near Amersham)	1947-1959	1959
26	Hucknall Camp	Nottinghamshire
27	Husbands Bosworth Camp	Leicestershire
28	Illford Park Camp	Devon (near Stover)
29	Keevil Camp	Wiltshire	1949-1957/58	1957/1958
30	Kelstern Airfield Camp	Lincolnshire
31	Kelvedon Camp	Essex	1949-1958/59	by 1959
32	Lilford School	Northamptonshire
33	Long Marston Camp	Warwickshire	1948 – 1968	1968
34	Lowther Park Camp	Cumbria (near Penrith)	1948-1955/56	by 1956
35	Ludford Magna Camp	Lincolnshire	1940-1955/56	by 1956
36	Lulsgate Camp	Bottom near Bristol
37	Market Harborough / Lubbenham Camp	Leicestershire
38	Marsworth Camp	Hertfordshire (near Dunstable)	1947-1960/61	1960/61
39	Melton Mowbray Camp	Leicestershire	1947-1961/62	1958
40	Mepal Camp	Cambridgeshire	1948-1958	by 1962
41	Morpeth Common Camp	Northumberland	1947-1962	1962
42	Nettlebed H o s t e l	Oxfordshire	1947 – 1955	1955
43	Northwick Park Camp	Gloucestershire	1947-1970	1970
44	Penley Camp	North Wales	1946 – 2002	2002
45	Penrhos Camp North Wales	North Wales
46	Perton H o s t e l	Wolverhampton
47	Petworth Camp	West Susex
48	Podington Camp	Bedfordshire	1948-1956	1956
49	Redcar Camp	North Yorkshire
50	Seighford Camp	Staffordshire
51	Southrop Camp	Gloucestershire
52	Springhill Lodges Camp	Gloucestershire	1947-1958	1958
53	St Mawgan Camp	Cornwall	1947-1951	1951
54	Stowell Park School	Gloucestershire
55	Sturgate Airfield Camp	Lincoln
56	Tilstock Higher Heath Camp	Shropshire	1947-late 1950s	late 1950s
57	Tweedsmuir Camp	Surrey
58	Weeting Hall Camp	Norfolk	1949-1955	1955
59	Wheaton Aston	Staffordshire		1965/1966
60	Wrothesley Camp	Wolverhanpton

Read more about the camps at Zosia Biegus’s excellent and very informative site, which also includes passenger lists of ships: ​http://www.polishresettlementcampsintheuk.co.uk/
and more information here
https://culture.pl/en/article/shelter-community-polish-post-war-resettlement-camps-in-the-united-kingdom

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KELVEDON CAMP SNAPSHOTS by Jerry Kubica: Growing up in a Polish Resettlement camp 1947-57