How were they treated, and seen by both the government and public?
I recently discovered my great grandfather was a German prisoner of war, named Kurt Wagner (I am not totally sure on the name/spelling). He had raped my Romani great grandmother when she was thirteen, in Essex, and left. I'd be grateful for any help in tracking down the man he was.
One ex POW you may have heard of was Bert Trautmann who became the goalkeeper for Manchester City and famously played on in a Cup Final despite breaking his neck.
Trautmann's Journey -from Hitler Youth to FA Cup Legend by Catrine Clay (Yellow Jersey Press, London , 2010) deals with his experience in POW camps and as an ex POW worker. Now this is of course one man's experience, and mostly based on his own recollections, but it seems people generally treated the POW's well- girls only too well at times- Trautmann got two girls pregnant (willingly it seems) and married one of them. And he wasn't alone- according to the book 796 British girls marrried POW's. It wasn't until Trautmann joined Manchester City, apparently. that he encountered much hostility, particularly from Jewish supporters of course.
The author gives a bibliography, though not line-by-line references. I'm guessing the following are her principal references concerning POWS:
Faulk, Henry, Group Captives, The Re-Education of German Prisoners of War, Chatto and Windus, 1977
Kynaston, David, Austerity Britain, Bloomsbury, 2007.