Jersey / Landmark

19 Peirson Road


Bookmark

Share

Directions


Led by Leslie Huelin and Norman Le Brocq, the Jersey Communist Party (JCP) first met in late 1943 at 19, Peirson Road, St Helier, where Leslie had a flat.

​​JCP members soon began circulating translated BBC news sheets amongst the foreign forced workers of the Organisation Todt, despite radios having been banned in June 1942. They also offered shelter to Russian slave workers who had escaped from their labour camps, through an informal network of Islanders. False identities and ration cards were provided through contacts at the Town Hall in St Helier, with assistance from the photographer who did all the identity card work. Sick Russians were cared for secretly by Dr McKinstry, the Medical Officer of Health, and by Mr Arthur Halliwell at the General Hospital.

 Later, the JCP made contact with a German anti-Nazi deserter named Paul Mülbach, with whom they went on to produce six propaganda leaflets designed to incite mutiny in the ranks. On the morning of 7 March 1945, Paul set fire to an ammunition store in the Palace Hotel, St Saviour, which was being used by the occupiers as a headquarters. The fire spread and the hotel was destroyed in the subsequent blast, possibly because of troops trying to clear a firebreak among the buildings.

​​An ardent Nazi – Vice-Admiral Hüffmier – was at that time in charge of the Channel Islands and was set on holding out until the bitter end. Norman, Paul, and the other members of the JCP therefore began to plot a co-ordinated mutiny for 1 May 1945 – International Workers’ Day. Premised upon the demoralised state of the cold and hungry average German soldier, the plan was that - on the signal of cannon fire from Elizabeth Castle - common soldiers would disarm their officers and then surrender the Island.

In his book ‘Growing Up Fast’, Bob Le Sueur described the finale:

‘Nervously I headed to Leslie Huelin’s flay on Peirson Road…Pushing open the door I was greeted by a glum-looking bunch of downcast revolutionaries who had been frustrated in their grandiose plan, apparently by the refusal of the officer in charge of Elizabeth Caslte to play his part…The revolution had melted away like the snow on the pavement.’