Survivors Name Included on Towns War Memorial

[Derek Black]

Has anyone tried removing the name of a survivor of the war, which was accidentally added, from a towns war memorial?

It can't have cropped up many times admittedly, as opposed to the ongoing pressure today to add names. However a lady confirmed today that a family member of hers was surprised to see his name added to his hometowns war memorial, even though he survived the war. She is unsure if he did anything about it at the time, but the name remains.

His name is quite unusual, so not just a similar name to a person who did die like in other apparent instances that have cropped up in the past. Pte 6533 Andrew Hulberg (aka Huldberg) from Bo'ness who served in the R.S.F.

SWMP thread link

Derek.

Edited 9 September , 2013 by Derek Black

[ss002d6252]

Presumably its a memorial specifically for war dead ?

Craig

[Derek Black]

It is indeed.

It's not a roll of service or something that would have all those who served. Just the usual town memorial with the names of the fallen.

Derek.

[Andrew Hesketh]

Was he erroneously reported killed or an unknown (at the time) PoW? This sounds odd so there must have been some sort of perceived reason. Unusual case.

[MBrockway]

It is indeed.

It's not a roll of service or something that would have all those who served. Just the usual town memorial with the names of the fallen.

Derek.

It is inscribed ...

To Our Glorious Dead

Salute the Memory of These Thy Sons who fought & laid down their Lives in the Great War

[NeilEvans]

There are two cases in shropshire, one from an error made in the late 70's I think. I'd love to see the name(s) removed, but it would open up a huge can of worms.

[MarkTurner]

My great grandfather (Arthur Aldridge in my signature below) used to say he was listed on the Bedfordshire Boer War memorial by mistake. Under the 2nd Bn listing there is an ALDRIDGE A listed. This however is another man 3627 Private A Aldridge 2nd Bn Mounted Infantry kia 6 June 1901 who presumably my great grandfather never knew.

[ralphjd]

We have one on our memorial (Milnrow)an MM winner who died in 1960, I have had names added (that's another story) but I would not dream of having his name removed, spoken to his grandson who is well aware that his g/dad is named on the memorial and is totally unconcerned. Ralph.

[stevem49]

Swanwick Derbyshire has four men who died in 1935. The Parish council decided that they should be added as they had served in WW1 !

SM

[Derek Black]

I can understand muster rolls which include all those who served, highlighting those who died. But unless it's a "lucky town" then a memorial should be just that, a memorial for the dead.

[Boreenatra]

We are doing some work on the war memorial in Grays and two names have cropped up (oddly next to each other) and we have good reason to think that both survived service in WW1. One is C.P.Campion (we think he is Cyril Paul Campion) and the other is A.Byron (Andrew Byron).Cyril was in the Royal Engineers and also the Essex Regiment and Andrew Byron spent many years in the Merchant Navy.passing in 1990 and Cyril in 1979. The vast majority of the 350 odd names on the war memorial are verified as war dead and although some are not verified as yet, there seems not to be any reason to think this is a roll of honour as the dedication on the memorial is to those who lost their lives and in a town like Grays there were many thousands who fought and survived both wars. We would never advocate taking names off memorials as these men served their country and should be remembered as such, and as many will know, finding any sort of paper trail to try and find who decided which names were to be included on the original memorial is difficult in the extreme. Thurrock council have not been able to help and any one with knowledge of either of these men would help hugely in our research. We feel that the fact they appear on this memorial is ok with us but would like to try and find why they appear there

Regards

Steve