CHAIRMAN’S REPORT
FOR THE YEAR 2013/14

CHAIRMAN’S REPORT 2014

Chairman Clive Armstrong

This is my second Chairman’s report, we have had a very busy year as a committee.

Firstly Our Events Over the last year, in summary.

We have attended or held the following events.

Municipal Diner. Held in July this event was poorly attended by the committee, those who did attend were treated to an excellent dinner, with amusing speeches afterwards.

Summer BBQ. In August we tried a new event, A summer B.B.Q., German Sausages were provided by Matius, additional trimmings were created by Angela and a couple of former Internees. Whilst this event was poorly attended, those who were there enjoyed a wonderfully sunny afternoon B.B.Q.

Visit to Bad Wurzach. At the beginning of October a small group from Jersey attended the twinning celebrations in Bad Wurzach, whilst I did not attend myself I am to understand that the whole event was enjoyable.

Field Of Remembrance. At the end of October, we attended the service and commencement of the annual Field of Remembrance, this is the second year that the Partnerschaft has been present and it was well attended, becoming more popular each year.

Remembrance Services. Both our remembrance services were once again a huge success, the event in the afternoon was well attended, followed by an excellent tea at the Omeroo Hotel.

November Get together. At the end of November our annual get together at the town hall was once again a huge success about 70 people were in attendance. An excellent tea was arranged and managed by Mathius, thank to him and his helpers.

Christmas get together. In December we arranged a committee event at the Mermaid, but unfortunealty we had to cancel on the day as only two members of the committee were attending.

69th Liberation anniversary. This has been a huge success, we had 6 Visitors from Bad Wurzach joining us, the delays in arriving and lost luggage did not affect their enthusiasm.

On the Saturday evening we had an excellent meal at the Vechia Milano. Followed by a concert by the salvation army band at the Opera House.

On Sunday we had a remembrance service at the War Tunnels followed by the laying of roses on the memorial stones. This was followed by an excellent tea provided Barbra of the Cafe. We thank Sir Micheal Birt and his wife for attending and his kind words said at the tea. It was also the first time we had chance to see the Red Cross’s new response vehicles proudly shown off by Nick and his team, this was the result of monies raised by the Bad Wurazach and back cycle challenge last year. It was so good to see so many new faces in attendance and opportunity to see various artifacts on display that had not been seen before.

Whilst this is only the second time we have arranged this event following and idea Stuart Shepard had it is becoming very popular this year it gained some good publicity in the local press.

On the Monday former internees were invited to Micheal and Jo Ginn’s for a afternoon tea, this was a huge success, we thank them both for organizing this.

I thank all those involved no matter how small a part they played in making the whole weekend what it was.

Farewells: We have to say goodbye to committee member Nicola Good who over the years has helped us so well, but due to commitments is unable to continue.

Mathius he has taken a back seat with regards to the committee whilst recovering from a Stroke earlier this year, we wish him well and a speedy recovery and hopefully see him in the future.

Website and Facebook page: Both of these are continuing to be developed whenever I get a chance I am adding more information.

Looking forward to the coming year We are lucky enough to be providing a Travel Bursary to Madeline who will be shortly travelling to Bad Wurzach to work, for some weeks.

Later this year we are hoping to recreated the famous football match of Christmas 1914, so far we have had a positive reaction to our initial ideas.

Next Year 2015 it will be the 70th anniversary of the liberation, I know it seems a little away but we need to start preparing for this monument us event in our Islands history with events both in Jersey and Bad Wurzach, we would welcome any ideas.

Finally

I hope that the offers of assistance for different events to be managed by individual committee members will continue. as the recent events overseen by Matthias and Stuart proved to be a huge success. Grateful thanks are also due to Angela for organizing events, I know it takes a lot of time but if they are split and shared around it helps take the pressure off individuals.

I would like to thank all of the committee for their time and support for my first year as chairman, and hope I can come up to your expectations in the future.

My apologies to anyone whom I have neglected to mention but thank you.

Clive Armstrong, Chairman of the St Helier Bad Wurzach Partnerschaft for┬2013 – 2014