CWGC question

[Terry Denham]

I doubt that they ever did stop accepting them.

There would have been no need. If the Forms were returned too late for inclusion in the register, the details would have been recorded for the next edition (which did not appear until the 1980s in most cases!). The PI (if any) could have been added to the headstone at any time.

I believe they were sent out in batches over a period of several years in the early 20s. The first batch had to be back by late 1920 when the first register was published. The majority of WW1 registers had been published by the mid 1930s - although a few were much later.

There seems to have been no obvious reluctance in general on the part of remarried women to inform IWGC of the fact. If you look through the registers/Debt of Honour database, you will see thousands of spouses who had remarried as shown by the names appearing as 'husband of Mary Smith (formerly Jones)'.

[Terry_Reeves]

Terry

Many thanks.

Terry reeves

[Paul Reed]

To add a little bit more to this, I found the following letter amongst my archives today which might be of interest. I have scanned it in b/w to reduce file size.

[Terry Denham]

As a follow on...

It is stated in "The Unending Vigil" that payment was not chased if it was not forthcoming.

[Guest Carolyn]

Do the actual registers of the CWGC still exist somewhere? I assume that there was more detail on these than appeared on the website.

I doubt that my great grandfather's next of kin (I'm not sure who his n-o-k was, it's a long story) returned his form. He just has his basic details on the CWGC database, although they did provide me with further details from the SDGW cd rom.

[Terry Denham]

Carolyn

CWGC published approx 1500 registers covering both wars.

They stopped publishing and selling them in January 2002. I was lucky enough to rescue the remaining stock before they were destroyed so that they could eventually find good homes. Much of this residual stock is now gone.

You will find that some large libraries hold nearly complete sets and occasionally they come on to the secondhand book market in varying numbers.

I have a complete set of all 1500 if you (or anyone else) wishes a look-up.

The registers only have one additional personal item not on the internet and that is a cause of death for some (only some if provided by the n-o-k) WW1 entries. There is a great deal of other interesting info in the introduction pages of some registers relating to the cemetery, cleared cemeteries etc.

[Jim Strawbridge]

I am researching female casualties of WWI and have been wondering for some time why the CWGC details in their registers are so sparse for the Women's Royal Air Force. Of the 89 casualties a whacking 42 entries (47%) in the CWGC registers do not show the next of kin. This proportion is way out of line with the other Services which in all cases are way over 90%. Now could it be that the issue of the form for completion by relatives was issued very late and few came back in time for consideration? Could this be because the WRAF would have been a fledgling organisation with some uncertainty as to if the RAF or WRAF had responsibilty for the forms issue (or at least the providing of nok names and addresses to the CWGC)? Any other ideas - for there is definitely an anomoly here?

Jim Strawbridge

[Terry Denham]

Jim

The sending out of the Final Verification Form was IWGC's responsibility but to addresses supplied by the RAF. The question is why did so few get returned?

An unreturned FVF will also mean no personal inscription on the headstone as well as no n-o-k details in the register/database. Of course some returned FVFs could also bear no additional details if the n-o-k so wished.

It is possible that they were sent out with only a short lead time before headstones/register entries had to be prepared. There would have been the procedural question of when IWGC was given responsibility for the graves of the RAF. Initially it was responsible only for those of the army with the navy being added later and then the RAF.

An interesting point would be to compare the 'basic' name entries with the date of register publication to see if they fall into a group.

[Guest A Mafia Man]

Good Evening All

I am new to this site and as such I am spending time reading through lots of the different threads that have been posted.

I particularly liked this thread as I have spent quite a few hours in the CWGC building at Maidenhead talking to members of staff about the role & work they undertake & how it all started etc.

This thread reminded me of a time I attended a fire, (I am a retired Fire Brigade Officer), in a thatched cottage in a quiet village to the north of Newbury, Berkshire, where we dealt with a small fire. The householders were an elderly couple both in their late nineties. The husband a small wiry man who insisted upon helping us. The wife was sat down crying.

After we had sorted out the problems, I went in and spoke to the wife to try and assure her that all was OK. She insisted on telling me a story about her husband, who had joined the army around 1915/16.

It appears that he was reported 'missing in action'. Then after some while he was reported 'killed in action'. She filled in various papers one of which was for the War Graves Commission.

After the war the village duly erected their War Memorial with all the names of the men who had not returned engraved upon it.

Sometime in 1925, the lady was interviewed by a local Police officer who informed her that her husband had been found alive & well & living in Paris with another lady!

From that day, to the day in question, she would tell this story to all.

When I went down to the village war memorial, sure enough there was the old boys name carved out on it.

The people involved are long departed now, but the memorial still bears the mans

name.

I would bet that there are a few other examples like this around the country where similar things happened ?

Joe

[Guest Carolyn]

It's funny that you should mention that at least one person MIA was later reported KIA and then found. I wonder exactly how many this happened to.

I know that 3 Companies of the 1st Bn ('B', 'C' & 'D') of the King's Liverpool Regiment were unaccounted for on 8th August 1916, and 'A' Company were gunned down. I did wonder if any of these men actually survived. I suspect not, but with them being MIA, perhaps there was a slim possibility that some of them could have ended up in a POW camp (I'm a novice at WW1 research so bear with me if I sound naive here).

Is there any way of finding out how many started off as MIA and then were presumed KIA?

Also, I have another question, sorry if this has been mentioned elsewhere. Did the MOD issue death certificates for WW1 casualties? Or were they issued by the registrar of the deceased's home town? Did certificates get issued at all if the men concerned were never found?