A particularly nice discovery was this carving of the Madonna and Child in Greystoke church.
A small hand witten and framed note associated with it explains that the statue was made from a log of Holly wood initially by Alfons Lug of Munich and continued by Fritz Hofman of Thuringia and Hans Fiesel(?) of Baden. These three men were among a party of some 400 German soldiers who were quartered at Greystoke Castle from the autumn of 1945 until April 1946 as Prisoners of War.
Lug, a master carver, started the work using only a pen-knife and a small chisel but was repatriated leaving Hofman, a joiner and Fiesel, a master painter to complete it. So poignant. Men who shortly before had been engaged in the universal human occupation of killing turned their hand to faith and the creation of this delightful object of religious veneration.
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