British P.O.W. camp guards.

[MikeyH]

The photo taken in 1916, shows N.C.O.s and Officers at the P.O.W. camp in Leigh, Lancashire, the town of my birth.  The sign above the Sergeants Mess is in Maori.  It apparently translates as, 'drunk trying to save self in Maori hut'.  The guard was drawn from the army reserve.  The camp was in Lilford Mill, a cotton mill, newly built in 1914 and taken over before any machinery was installed. The photo was taken from a local history forum.  Another image shows the guards armed with single shot Martini-Henry rifles in 1914.  Some of the prisoners entrained each working day for the nearby Irlam Steel Works.  My late grandmother could remember the prisoners marching through the town to attend the burials of their comrades in the local cemetery.

Mike.