Guernsey Press article on ‘Guernsey Week’

Some of the Guernsey visitors with their Biberach hosts. Left to right are Margaret Walter, Rotraud Rebmann, Jurat the Rev. Peter Lane, Wendy Lane, Pastor Eberhard Goehner, Dorothy Le Conte and Jurat David Le Conte.

Chief minister among visitors to German town with close island links.

Guernsey’s close relationship with the German town of Biberach was further strengthened last month. The town holds ‘Guernsey Week’ every five years, to celebrate the close partnership that has developed between the area and the island.

Biberach was the site of the internment camp to which around 1,200 English-born residents of the Channel Islands were deported during the Second World War as a reprisal for the deportation of German nationals from the Kingdom of Iran to South Australia.

Fourteen of the deportees to Biberach never returned. Nowadays the relationship continues to be healed with events such as last month’s Guernsey Week.

Between 23 and 28 October, a number of islanders visited Biberach to discuss the relationship and provide insights into the Guernsey way of life.

Chief Minister Jonathan Le Tocq was among the visitors. He met with the mayor of Biberach, Oberburgermeister Norbert Zeidler, to discuss further ways to develop the bond that has come to exist between their two communities.

The chief minister also attended a service at which Jurat the Rev. Peter Lane spoke about the blessing and benefits that spring from reconciliation, and conveying greetings from the Bailiff as well as the Rev. Mike Kierle and Fr Michael Hoare.

After the service Biberach was treated to some Guernsey food and drink, with a large pot of bean jar and samplings of White Rock beer. Many other insights into Guernsey were presented to the residents of Biberach. Jurat Lane gave a talk in German on the jurats’ role in Guernsey’s legal system. Jurat David Le Conte talked about the origins and significance of the Guernsey flag, as well as the thinking behind the design and construction of our Liberation monument.

Seven students from Guernsey, the ‘Young Ambassadors’, were also part of the visiting contingent. The Young Ambassadors visited schools to give presentations and ran a stall in the market square selling Guernsey butter and gache. They also attended the monthly evensong, led by the 53-strong Biberach boys’ choir, who are hoping to visit Guernsey in August next year.

Several members of the Guernsey party, including jurats Lane and Le Conte, paid their respects at the cemetery that holds the graves of those islanders who never returned home.

by Ben Francis (Guernsey Press)