Help locating13th Corps Main Dressing Station cemetery please

[Andy Wade]

Thanks again chaps. much appreciated.

That's a very good idea Chris. I'll do that. But tomorrow...

Watching something develop on the telly at the moment, nodding off in the chair. Time for bed, and await the results tomorrow. No political comments other than that!

[Howard]

A map I had overlooked is this one, also on the WFA DVD:- M_5_000771.jpg, 1:40,000, 62D, 1916

It is annotated with cemeteries and marked AAM on reverse, it is also marked "From Messer collection " (I am not sure what that means, probably another IWGC/CWGC officer.)

The annotation of a number in blue pencil on an "AAM" map is characteristic of those showing what is thought to be exhumed bodies, soldiers collected from the battle fields and later re-buried. (One of this series is currently on show in the IWM covering part of the Somme battlefield.) In square J20 there is a 1 in square c, but you never know……. CWGC records sometimes show the map ref. of original burials and those moved to concentration cemeteries.

In the IWM there is a series of maps informally known as the Body Density series. When I was involved with building the database and scanning the maps, we took care to enter "Body Density" against those marked AAM, Sir Herbert Ellissen or others simply showing cemeteries or burials. I have just reviwed these 121 maps and have found nothing more for map 62D.

Howard

[Andy Wade]

That's amazing Howard, I had no idea that these particular maps were accessible and the markings make them unique. Quite a privilege to see them.

Thank you very much for posting the detail.

Even though there is one burial in Square J. 20, I can't see it being John Thomas Raw as his record does state he was at the dressing station when he died of his wounds and the only dressing station that this could have been is the one to the North of Lone Tree cemetery in square J. 24. Very little evidence to suggest that anything went on at square J. 20.