Home Fires

Some of the things that went on after the war did rather take the gloss off winning didn't they? The thought of cosying up to Stalin is so incredible now.

I wonder what criteria they used to decide who stayed and who had to return to the Eastern bloc. We had a Polish neighbour who had been in the Resistance as a young man and been captured and in a concentration camp. He managed to escape from the lorry taking them to be shot and hide till the American liberated the area. He stayed with them and British troops acting as an interpreter, as he spoke several languages, and ended up in hospital in UK as he had developed TB. He married one of his nurses and went to University in UK and worked for a defence company till he retired. He was not allowed to travel back to Poland etc once he was working on defence projects.

That's the key Welshwife, your Polish chap married his nurse so he would have been allowed to stay on here after the war. Someone working on defence projects would never ever have been allowed to visit Poland which was part of the Soviet block, until the fall of communism. I knew someone who'd married a German POW, and through that marriage he was able to stay here. Luckily he came from West Germany and could visit as frequently as he liked. There is a book called The Victims of Yalta which does explain, in detail the reasons for these repatriations including the fact that Britain and America agreed to hand over Poland to Stalin in return amongst other things that Russia would support the allies in the Far East. Not really cosying up to Stalin, more like protecting particular agendas. No different from today really!!!!

There was a Polish Government-in-exile in England during the war. A lot of Poles stayed here afterwards, and of course many pilots had joined the RAF here; if you have ever seen a White Eagle Club it was started by Poles. One of the boys I knew when I was young had Polish parents and I am sure the family visited Poland in the 1960s (he brought me back a present which I still have).

The Soviet army withdrew from Czechoslovakia after WW2, so presumably the Czech soldiers featured in this series would have gone back there after the war. It was a communist state but not part of the USSR.

In 1948 Czechoslovakia became part of the Warsaw Pact, in other words a Soviet satellite country, with a puppet government approved by Moscow. Remember the Prague Spring in 1968, and how that ended. Hungary was the same, rising up in 1956 and both uprisings brutally crushed by Russian military. None of the countries of the Eastern bloc were part of the USSR, but all had puppet governments approved by Moscow. Almost certainly Marek would have gone home, but who knows what his future would have been, pre war officer classes were viewed with suspicion by the communists!

Whereas Poland became part of the Soviet Union, therefore the Poles were allowed to stay here.

Yes, I remember, and had a friend who was a child refugee from Hungary.

However, because the Soviet troops had withdrawn from Czechoslovakia and the government colluded with Moscow expelling ethnic Germans from the country, it was still a 'free' country therefore those Czech soldiers would have been sent back again.

Russia liberated a lot of allied POW from camps in eastern germany, and once the cold war started Stalin was reluctant to release them, and in return demanded the repatriation of Warsaw Pact nationals! He had to be placated to prevent further incursions into the West particularly Berlin and to get the POW back, so the nationals had to go back.

Didn't some Czechs go to Canada after WW" - we can only hope that the lovers manage to get there and live happily after after, perhaps Bob will fall into the canal.

WW2!

Yes they did, but I think Marek will want to go home, and we have to get rid of Bob! !! Also Marek has to stay alive!! Lots of hurdles, but fingers crossed!

Oh! Has the plane crashed on the house where the baby's being born?

No. It didn't crash on a house, just knocked the chimney off one.

Didn't it crash into the front of a house?

Not sure which one though.

I thought it had knocked a chimney off one, then crashed into the front of another, ana.

Was that the last episode in this series?

""""perhaps Bob will fall into the canal.""""

or get a wee push

It was embedded in the front of a house but not sure which one.. but the baby was definitely crying somewhere.

^ thought it had knocked a chimney off one, then crashed into the front of another^
Yes, that's what I think happened. I don't know which house it was, but we could hear the new born baby's cries, so I think it possibly was where the baby was born.

And yes, Cherrytree, it was the last episode of this series. Bummer. How on earth are we meant to wait till next May to find out what happened?

Oops, rogue space prevented the italics!!! That'll teach me to post without previewing

Indinana I was reading on Twitter that the 3rd series hasn't even been commissioned yet, I can't imagine that they wouldn't make a follow up series.

What a cliffhanger! The thing is, by the time the next series comes along, I'll have completely forgotten most of the story.

Noooooo! There just has to be a third series, tanith! I will never, ever trust ITV again if they leave it there

I shall feel bereft on a Sunday night now. No Durrells, no Home Fires.
No, they can't just leave it there. I'd like to see Bob get his come-uppance, and Pat her happiness with Marek.