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The Great War (1914-1918) Forum

Remembered Today:

brompton cemetry chelsea.


herbie4798

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hi all. after visiting a war memorial in hackney today i come across a man from the 10th londons whos date of death was 9/12/14 and is buried in brompton memorial. why were these men buried at home? has anyone any photos of the cemetry?

james

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Could have died during training, a lot of men did from sickness such as meningitis. Also men who were badly wounded were shipped home for further treatment in hospitals in the UK.

http://www.theadamsresidence.co.uk/brompton/bromptcem.htm

Cheers, Michelle

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Hi James, I have found that soldiers were buried at home because of an accident or transfered to a hospital on the mainland and died from wounds or diseases.
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thank you very much to both of you for your replies. that makes sense. my first thought was that he died in training. im going to have a dig about on this soldier and see what happend. thanks again for your help.

james

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James,

Is this your chap?

From Free BMD:

Burling Thomas 24 Chelsea 1a 492

++

Name: BURLING

Initials: T

Nationality: United Kingdom

Rank: Private

Regiment/Service: London Regiment

Unit Text: 10th Bn.

Date of Death: 09/12/1914

Service No: 1696

Casualty Type: Commonwealth War Dead

Grave/Memorial Reference: N. 172745.

Cemetery: BROMPTON CEMETERY

++

You can get a death certificate for him, since his death was registered in the UK (ie. not on the overseas section). The register volume and page number for ordering a certificate from the GRO is above. He most likley died 'at home' (meaning UK). Also there are quite a number of CWGC burials from both World Wars in this cemetery - is there not a hospital close by which would be the likely 'source' of these casualties?

Ian

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hi ian, yes thats my man. im going to try and order his death certificate either this week or next. well the 1st/10th londons didnt go overses till 1915 so thats why i think he died either training or disease. say it were chelsea hospital could help me would they release information?

james

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James,

I somehow doubt that hospitals carry records from that far back, though you can always try. The death certificate will at least clarify what he died from and where.

Maybe another avenue to explore would be local newspaper archives for the district he came from. They often carried casualty lists and write ups, particularly at that early stage of the war.

Ian

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hi ian, yes thats my man. im going to try and order his death certificate either this week or next. well the 1st/10th londons didnt go overses till 1915 so thats why i think he died either training or disease. say it were chelsea hospital could help me would they release information?

james

Hi James. You will realise, I expect, that the Royal Chelsea Hospital, where the Chelsea Pensioners live, was not a hospital in the normal sense? I think the Brompton is perhaps a better bet for a soldier dying of illness or injury.

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Although he is buried in Brompton he could have died anywhere in the UK. The next of kin of those who died at home were given the option of having the soldier brought home for burial.

If he died in a hospital, it would have been a military operated one. Their Admission & Discharge books were passed to the War Office and then MOD, who decided in the early 80s to destroy 95% of them prior to transfer to the National Archives (then PRO). So sadly those records have probably been lost. The surviving ones are in class MH106.

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thanks for your reply paul, good information as usual, why destroy most of the records? thats a shame. hopefully the death certificate will give me an idea how he died then work back.

james

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...why destroy most of the records? ...

Simple answer to that one, James, is you can't keep everything. When you're dealing with the 'business records' of State, that's one ginormous amount of paper accruing each year! It looks like they kept a representative sample of that class of records for posterity but, as Paul says, disposed of the great bulk of them, having no further business use for them and having taken the view that the intrinsic historical value of the complete record set didn't justify the cost of preserving them in perpetuity. A shame, as you say, but a fact of life :(

Jim

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totally agree jim. like you say thats a lot of paper work there! suposse its different these days with everything done on computer and that. like you say it is the sad fact of life unfortunatley.

james

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Although he is buried in Brompton he could have died anywhere in the UK. The next of kin of those who died at home were given the option of having the soldier brought home for burial.

But as I posted, his death was registered in the district of Chelsea, so my money would be on his dying in hospital, though I agree that is speculation.

Ian

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Ian, I hadn't noticed that, but I agree your speculation is sound in that respect.

James/Jim - I suppose it is 'a fact of life' but these records were just part of a whole collection of medical records dating from WW1. Together they would have filled in many gaps left by the bombing of service records, and a group of us did try to save them in the 80s, but back then the general public were not as aware of the importance of such things as they are now, so we sadly failed.

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a good effort from all of you for trying paul. i was only a baby when that was happening, It is like the saying, "you wont miss it until its gone" how true.

james

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Paul

As you say, they could have filled some gaps! Yes, there does seem to be more public awareness of the value of these 'recent' but already historical records now - but, as we know, this almost didn't save the MICs :o I wonder what early 21st century records will be available to 22nd century researchers? :rolleyes:

Jim

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James/Jim - to be honest I think it was public awareness that saved the MICs. When they came under threat because of the awareness, it was easy to raise press interest. Back in the 80s that wasn't possible.

Given the electronic nature of current records one does wonder what will have survived in a 100 years; the survival rate could be worse than pre-1800 records!

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I traced my wife's great aunt's first husband (she didn't know there had been one) through death certificate, and found that he'd died of tuberculosis. He was buried in London, but then he came from Wandsworth.

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