Finding E.C.Edwards of Kent and Anglesey

[clive_hughes]

Hi folks,

On the war memorial at Llanddaniel Fab on Anglesey is the name of Edward Charles Edwards, with an address (Ty'n Lon Bodlew) and the (incorrect) date February 1918.  

Soldiers Died shows him as 13689 Private 9th Battn. R.Welsh Fusiliers, born Beckenham, Kent, enlisted in Llangefni, Anglesey about September 1914, and killed in action France/Flanders 18 April 1918.  No known grave, Tyne Cot Memorial.  The 1914-15 Star roll actually dates his death as between 8-18.4.18, which reflects the confusion of the battalion's involvement in the successive German offensives that Spring, and that at one point its records were deliberately burnt. 

Some light has been thrown on him by a June 1918 newspaper article in an Anglesey Welsh-language periodical, which stated that he was a "stranger from Kent", a lad  who had been accepted into service by Mr. Richard Jones of the above farm, who had shown him kindness and enabled him to make his home there.  This "quiet and gentle lad" had attended the local (Anglican) Church and Sunday School, despite being monoglot-English; and they gave him a memorial service in late May 1918.  He is also on the parish's list of war dead in the North Wales Memorial Arch in Bangor.  

No-one claimed his pay or gratuities, or his medals.  No "next of kin" location is shown in Soldiers Died or elsewhere.   I've had a go at trying to trace him in the 1901 and 1911 Censuses, but not with any success.  Certainly he wasn't at the farm in 1911.   I did wonder given the lack of next-of-kin whether he might have come from an orphanage or similar background?

Any suggestions or other assistance would be welcomed.

Clive 

[Dai Bach y Sowldiwr]

Hi @clive_hughes,

I can't suggest anything concrete, but if you want to research all things Llanddaniel-Fab, may I show you this site which sadly is no more.
Fortunately once it's on the net it's always on the net, and by using the Wayback machine, the site can be restored from archive.
It contains census results transcribed for the parish, which might save you going back through digital images on Ancestry.

Also chapel gravestones, rate-books and other aspects relating to the history of the village:

https://web.archive.org/web/20190408235820/http://llanddaniel.co.uk/index.html

Trivia: I went to school with the daughter of Bodlew Farm, her mother was a famous Soprano who won the Blue-Riband at the Natonal Eisteddfod once.

[clive_hughes]

Diolch Dai,

A very handy resource - I had heard of Wayback machine but never thought to try it for research purposes.  

I was wrong about his address - glanced too quickly at the war memorial photo - it was actually Tynlon Bellaf, though an Arthur Jones who was another local fatality was from Tynlon Bodlew.  The latter is just several houses away from Bodlew farm proper. 

Much obliged to you.

Clive