My Local Cemetery

[stevew]

This scenario has probaly been mentioned before, so apologies if I am going over old ground!!

I thought I would look at the names of the lads on my local war memorial and discovered that 2 are buried in the local church. In fact my local church has 2 burials from WW1 and one from WW2 (according to CWGC). One of the lads from the WW1 has a DCM and MM, so I was interested to see his grave.

I pay the visit to the church and find 2 CWGC headstones easily, the 2 I find are not the one I am looking for - but nevertheless I was pleased to see them. The further headstone was not visible at all.

The unusual sharp eyes of the missus (I was amazed I actually got her into the church in the first place as looking at war cemeteries is not her favourite pastime!)

spots the headstone I am looking for..........but it's not a CWGC headstone!!!! Strange I thought. Has anyone got any ideas as to why this headstone is not a CWGC headstone, especially as the soldier in question is mentioned as a casualty on CWGC.

BTW........the casualty is R E Brine, DCM, MM. DoD 19th March 1919

[Terry Denham]

Steve

About 20% of war graves in the UK have private memorials.

When a casualty died in the home country, the nok were allowed to bury the body where they wished and to select whether they wanted an official headstone (when they became available) or to have a private stone - two concessions not allowed for those who died overseas.

If they chose the latter course, the stone is not the responsibility of CWGC in terms of maintenance but that of the relatives.

The choice of a private stone in no way affects the grave's status as an official war grave and the name etc of the person must be recorded by CWGC. They also inspect them every couple of years to check whether the name is visible and if it is in a very poor state they will try to get something done about it within the limitations of their powers over these private graves.

Many private stones were in place before the official CWGC stone was available. However, many people could not afford a stone at all and so were happy when CWGC erected theirs and maintained it 'in perpetuity'.

[stevew]

Terry,

Thanks for that quick reply..........brilliant explanation

Thanks

[PhilB]

Terry, there are a few private graves and stones in F&F aren`t there? I`m sure I`ve seen one or two. Did they just slip through the net? Phil B

[Terry Denham]

Yes there are - and in other parts of the world.

Several (wealthy) relatives erected private headstones on their loved ones' graves during the war - before the final decisions on the style and rules of the official headstone were formulated.

After the war when CWGC took over the cemeteries from the army and began to construct the architecture and set up headstones etc, they made a concerted effort to persuade the relatives of these private headstone graves to replace them with the official version to conform with the idea of total equality etc. (It also meant that the private individuals did not have to maintain them - an incentive to go 'official').

Most agreed and the private memorials were removed but some refused and these remnants can still be seen today in a few locations.

The same applied to isolated graves where nok initially objected to their removal to a cemetery. Most agreed in the end but there are still three or four in their original locations.