Like many members of the intelligensia, Hugo Dachinger, from Vienna, Austria, and Walter Nessler, was from Dresden, Germany, realised that their lives would be endangered by the tightening Nazi grip on their two countries.
Dachinger (1908 - 1995) was Jewish and Nessler (1912 - 2001) painted what the Nazis labelled "degenerate art". The only real possibility of survival was to leave.
As a leading port, most internees were despatched through Liverpool to the Isle of Man. Inevitably, areas like Huyton became holding camps while these sad human cargoes were processed for departure.
While Hugo Dachinger was interned at Mooragh camp, Isle of Man, for several months, he staged an art exhibition in the camp called Art Behind the Barbed Wire, which inspired the title for the Walker's exhibition.
Meantime, Walter Nessler joined the British Army's Pioneer Corps, serving in France. In all, the two men were together in Huyton for about three or four months and were interned for about six months in total.
