I got to the bottom of this and I'm posting it in case anyone else runs into this. The issue occurred because the try/catch block was in a transactional service. Although grails reported that the exception was thrown during the save() call, in reality it was called AFTER the entire method, when the transaction was committed.
I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.