Update, 11 Dec 2011: these buildings are being/have been demolished. They were already being dismantled in advance of the council meeting to decide the issue.
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The World War Two 'hutments' – a former hostel for servicemen – appear to be doomed to demolition though the recent planning application was withdrawn.
So here's 'a homily on the hutments'.
. . . . . .
At first I was just amused by the word 'hutments' on a yellow planning notice. I then heard of the site's association with Canadian airmen, and got more interested. How things change. Some years ago, before I started this website, the mere phrase 'Canadian airmen' wouldn't have resulted in me dashing towards town with my camera on a cold January day.
I was never that bothered about all that World War Two aircraft-related history. It's usually a 'boy thing'. When I was in my teens, my brother had a large picture of a Lancaster bomber (or was it a Halifax) displayed prominently in the front room of his first home. When I was a child, Rufforth airfield – formerly used in the war – was close to our Acomb home. Neither of these things held any interest.
A few discoveries and contacts began to change this ignorance/lack of interest.
I don't feel excited by visions of military glory. War depresses me, wars then and wars now. Memorials were my 'way in' to understanding more about the impact of World War Two in York and Yorkshire, specifically two memorials discovered in the surrounding area within a week of one another. Memorials bypass some of the aspects of commemorating war that I find quite uncomfortable – in their quiet way, so thoughtfully-placed, and thought-provoking.
The accidentally-discovered memorials drew me towards the subject, and I kept finding them, in churches, church porches, by roadsides, by the now-crumbling local airfields. In random places, where aircraft fell on their way back from raids, or on training. Many other crash sites have no memorial – we couldn't mark them all, there were too many.
I had an email from a lady in Canada, who had seen my photo of the memorial at Aldborough, and thanked me for including it, as her brother had been one of those who died there.
Among the numbers and names on the Aldborough memorial was a mention of 'Eastmoor', where that Canadian crew were based. Most of the local airfields seem to be named logically after the nearby village, but perhaps Sutton on the Forest was considered too long and unwieldy. However that's where Eastmoor (aka East Moor) is, and a little reading led me to it, or rather, led me to finding it on the map. Cycling led me to it, eventually, after about ten miles of pedalling up narrow roads and a muddy track.
There's not much left of it, but enough to see where an airfield used to be. In those times of war, Canada sent over its fit young men, as many other countries did, and they ended up at East Moor and other airfields around us in the Vale of York and beyond. It meant a lot to me that so many years on, through the modern wonders of the internet, Audrey had sent an email from Canada to England which had led me back to the airfield where her brother had taken off from. And had made me curious, following something that was no longer just a name carved on a memorial.
Though I kept finding them everywhere, those memorials, to crews from different countries, stationed here.
Later, in response to my pages on the airfield memorials, I had another email, from Stephen, who thanked me for including them. He felt, as I know many people do who lived through those times, that the bomber crews and the places associated with them aren't enough in people's minds. Those who know about this aspect of our history often mention that Bomber Command were never properly credited after the war for their role. I guess it's because their role was 'offensive' rather than 'defensive' – it's easier for us to support the brave Spitfire pilots chasing off the German aircraft, as many TV programmes have recently. It's difficult to feel proud of bombing raids, when you see photos of the results on German cities. But they were desperate, desperate times. And those who lived in cities here, bombed by German aircraft – like Stephen in York, and my mum, in Hull – saw the bombing as part of the fight back, a necessary retaliation.
I've always seen myself as a pacifist, but that's easy when you haven't got bombs landing in your street.
So, back to the present, and back close to home. So close to home that I can walk there in ten minutes, to some scruffy old hutments, a hostel where the airmen stayed, on their way through the city, between postings.
They're just an 'eyesore' now, to most people. So, the old hutments will be flattened, and most people will be pleased that they're out of the way, giving us a better view of the inside of a wall.
Does the actual building connected with a person or event need to be kept, for us to connect with our history, their lives? Despite my embracing of internet technology, I'd still say yes.
Increasingly, in our digital age, we can look at the locations on a screen, see cleverly assembled images. Obviously I must think that photos of buildings have some use, or I wouldn't spend so long making the 'digital resource' of this website.
Despite this, I think that however carefully I present my digital material, it's nothing like being there. And the Museums Trust's digital resource of the airmen's hostel will be nothing like being there either.
If the buildings and associated settings weren't important in our understanding of history, we wouldn't have so many of them kept, proudly advertising their connection with historical figures. Just recently I rediscovered an account in a diary of my visit to the Brontë Museum at Haworth, about twenty years ago. I'd read Brontë novels and seen photos of their former home, but standing in it, looking out on the nearby graveyard, or seeing where in the house the desk was positioned, where some of those novels I'd read had been written, had clearly been valuable – the excitement was clear in my scribblings.
There's no way we'd think it was acceptable to relocate that house to some more convenient nearby location, as the context of it in its surroundings was crucial to an understanding. But the report on the WW2 hutments suggests we might preserve something of our old airmen's hostel by relocating one of the huts to nearby Eden Camp.
Or, as has been suggested to me, we might get some idea of their history by seeing similar huts at the Yorkshire Air Museum at Elvington. I've been to the Air Museum – it's a wonderful place, created with love and care. But it's an airfield. Which is rather different to a small hostel site in a city centre location.
Of course, the context is all. Asbestos-ridden pre-fabs are not in themselves of much architectural interest. But in this place, grouped around a brick tower, erected rapidly in the war years on a city centre site, they're evocative, moving, curious, strange. Also peaceful. A place where airmen slept. Perhaps a last night of sleep before the big sleep.
Thank you for reading.