"I had a letter from Vaughan Williams...": Letters from the Mooragh Camp by Peter Gellhorn
Channel: Culture Vannin
Date: 2021-01-29

Readings from the personal letters of the conductor and composer, Peter Gellhorn, who was held in the Mooragh Internment Camp from 1940 until 1941.
The letters here to his wife reflect something of his feelings, preoccupations and also his artistic and creative life within the camp.
These extracts are read here by Peter Gellhorn's daughter, Barbara Gellhorn, who reads them from within the grounds of the former camp on Ramsey Promenade in the Isle of Man.

The conductor and composer, Peter Gellhorn (1912-2004), was a professional musician in England under the outbreak of war, whereupon he was arrested as an 'enemy alien' and interned in Mooragh Camp on Ramsey Promenade.
While here Gellhorn gave piano recitals, played the organ in the local church, directed ensembles and choirs, and composed several works including two studies for violin, two works for string quartet, and a work for strings and male voices, 'Mooragh,' in a setting of words by F. F. Bieber, a fellow internee.
Gellhorn was eventually released on 21 January 1941 after intervention by Ralph Vaughan Williams in his role as chair of the Committee for the Release of Interned Alien Musicians.

More information about Peter Gellhorn, his music, and his time interned in the Isle of Man is available here:
https://www.petergellhorn.com/

Barbara Gellhorn visited the Isle of Man in 2017 to accompany 'Singing a Song in a Foreign Land‎,' the Royal College of Music research and performance project highlighting the contribution of musicians who fled from Nazi Germany and Austria ‎to musical life in Britain and beyond.
https://www.rcm.ac.uk/singingasong/

These Isle of Man concerts were generously supported by the Isle of Man Arts Council, Culture Vannin and the Malcolm Scott Dickinson Charitable Trust.

This film was produced by Culture Vannin.
Culture Vannin exists to promote, support and celebrate the culture of the Isle of Man.
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