A trap for unwary researchers?

[J T Gray]

Like many others I've researched the names on my local war memorials - not with any thoroughness, as I've also researched lots of other things...

One of the local churchyards has a list of who is buried where in it. Several of these names include details suggesting that they were soldiers, and two were marked as "unknown location" - which I would have read as being in the churchyard, but the grave location unknown.

Closer inspection of the graveyard- luckily a small country one - revealed a total of five soldiers all of whom the wording of the index suggested were buried there.

A little searching of CWGC confirmed my suspicion that these were all private commemorations on family stones - quite why the two are noted as "unknown" location I am not sure - possibly a stone has been moved. However of the five, three are still missing (commemorated at Thiepval, the Loos Memorial and Tyne Cot). Of the remaining two one is buried at Bailleul and the last is probably (there is not enough detail to be certain that it is the same man) buried at Kensal Green.

And just to top it off, only one of the five is recorded on the village war memorial!

So several morals to the story - don't take anything at face value without checking it being the prime one, and if you are researching a village go through the graveyard too.

Five years ago I DID take the listing at face value - now that I have checked the graveyard all has become clear. So for experienced researchers I doubt there is any need for my tale, but if you are just starting out beware!

Adrian