Hislop thumbs up

[Gibbo]

A really good programme and a particular boost for those of us who "do" war 2 - the smashed memorial. Was this the one that we had a thread about fairly recently - the one the Sun had a piccie of? Seems a bit of co-incidence for two bank memorials to ened up in skips.

John

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I've dug out the old thread & it doesn't say which bank. The picture of the remnants of the memorial scanned in from the Sun does, however, look pretty similar to that examined by Ian Hislop in the TV programme.

Sun story on smashed war memorial

[Neil Mackenzie]

It is definately the same memorial. Ian Hislop talked to a relative of VSA Tardif whose name is on the memorial and who joined the Civil Service Rifles.

From memory the programme said that the memorial had been in a branch of National Bank which became part of Nat West and is now part of Royal Bank of Scotland. The latter are to get the memorial repaired and relocated so a happy ending if nothing else.

Neil

[John_Hartley]

Martin

Thanks for the link - I couldnt find it to check. Yep, yer man's name is on it.

John

[David Seymour]

The Buckland "telegram" looked very much like a letter! Taff has recently made this point elsewhere on the Forum.

It is a pity that they hid from the viewer the process of research. There were many "discoveries" but all seemed to emerge magically.

Having said that, however, the programme had many good points and will no doubt stimulate much interest nationwide in war memorials. If that happens something priceless will have been achieved.

The War Memorials Trust would, no doubt, like to hear from all who share its interest - www.warmemorials.org

David

[brownag]

From memory the programme said that the memorial had been in a branch of National Bank which became part of Nat West and is now part of Royal Bank of Scotland. The latter are to get the memorial repaired and relocated so a happy ending if nothing else.

Neil

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The National Bank branches in England and Wales merged with the national Commercial Bank of Scotland in 1966 but kept their identity. In 1969 the NCBS merged with the RBS to form the Royal Bank of Scotland. In 1970 the National Bank branches became William and Glynn branches when that bank was formed as a wholly owned subsidiary of the RBS. By the mid 1980s the W&G branches were rebranded as Royal Bank of Scotland branches and their head office buildings in London were relocated and old properties sold off. Natwest are not to blame here.

I believe in the programme the Royal bank admitted that they lost track of their National Bank memorial around that time when so much else was happening. It's no excuse but I think this has been a sequence of unfortuante events rather than a deliberate abandonment of the memorial.

When the old Commercial Bank head office on George Street in Edinburgh was closed and sold off the war memorials were moved into other Royal Bank properties in St Andrew Square. (The Great War Panels are in 36 St Andrew Square along with the RBS memorial and the Second World War Memorial is in 42 St Andrew Square along with the National Bank of Scotland memorial).

The programme makers also pointed out that the Royal Bank was going to repair the National Bank Memorial and I asume it will be placed in a prominent place in one of the Royal Bank buildings in London.

Thanks

Adam

[Neil Mackenzie]

Adam.

Thanks for your update.

Neil

[Kath]

Was it TARDIF who lived in a Peabody building?

Has anyone the exact address?

I've a casualty of the "Royal Edward" who lived in the Peabody building Errol St., Whitecross St., East Finsbury.

Thanks, Kath.

[Jim Strawbridge]

I am not as happy as I should be with this one. I had a researcher spend a full afternoon here at home trawling through my catalogued information on WW1 serving female casualties. She was looking for interesting stories so that they could "find" a memorial, appear to pick out a name and then reveal the story from the name. She went away with a fistful of information. I also know that the same happened with Dennis Aston, researcher of munition workers. Since then neither of us have heard a thing. An email to the researcher shows that she has moved on and an email to the editor has remained unanswered. Even if they don't use any of the information that we have supplied it would have been common courtesy to have kept us informed.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

After a prompt from me the Production Secretary has written back a pleasant enough email to say that any information that Dennis and I had provided, if used, will be in the third programme of the series to be broadcast on the 4th December focusing on women during the Great War. I just wish that their communication skills had been a bit better.

[AB64]

Was it TARDIF who lived in a Peabody building?

Has anyone the exact address?

I've a casualty of the "Royal Edward" who lived in the Peabody building Errol St., Whitecross St.,  East Finsbury.

Thanks, Kath.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I think it was the Guardsman, Buckley or similar name who lived in the Peabody building .

Alistair

[squirrel]

IIRC the Peabody Buildings in question were near Victoria Street SW1; the name of the road on one side of the estate is Old Pye Street and the the other Abbey Orchard Street.

[burlington]

I thought the programme was good.

A different side to Ian Hislop!

[brownag]

Further to my post last night I did a bit more digging around and spoke to a very helpful lady at the Royal Bank of Scotland Group Archives.

The National Bank Memorial will be located in the London City Office of the Royal Bank of Scotland at 62-63 Threadneedle Street when it has been repaired. There is no date for this yet. When the Williams & Glyn branch, which originally had the memorial, closed the business went to Threadneedle Street branch so it is felt this is the most appropriate place for the memorial to go.

From what they can work out when the branch was closed the building was sold very quickly and then sold again to an overseas company very quickly after that. In the mean time there had been a lot of upheaval at Williams & Glyns / Royal Bank of Scotland so when it came to tracking down the memorial the trail was cold.

This happened 20 years ago before the RBS Group had a policy on the maintenance of its war memorials but in the mean time the lessons have been learned and now if a building is being closed or sold the war memorial is removed before the closure rather than after. In fact the memorials mentioned in my post last night which were at the now closed 42 St Andrew Square Office were moved last July for the opening of the Bank’s new headquarters at Gogarburn on the outskirts of Edinburgh. (The National Bank of Scotland’s memorials for the Great War and Second World War, and the Commercial Bank of Scotland’s memorial for the Second World War.) The memorials have been given a prominent spot next to the Executive block in the campus.

The Royal Bank of Scotland is now responsible for approx. 270 war memorials and the Group Archives department are nearly finished compiling a database of these memorials which will shortly be passed to the UKNIWM.

For a list of the constituent banks which merged / were taken over and now make up the Royal Bank of Scotland Group you can go to the History pages of Bank’s own website:

http://www.rbs.com/about03.asp?id=ABOUT_US...ST_CONSTITUENTS

Cheers

Adam

[Guest Simon Bull]

On the subject of the burning down of Luton Town Hall. My mother Ruby (now 95 years old) was there with her mother and father (Ex. Sapper Herbert (Shub) Land East Angian RE's , one of 5 serving brothers who all returned).

  Grand-dad saw trouble brewing and said "you girls had best be getting home". As they crossed the footbridge over the railway to High Town, they turned to see the Town Hall going up in flames.

  Their next door neighbour got 3 months hard labour for riotous disturbance.

  The piano was dragged out of Farmers Music shop which was just over the road from the Town Hall. I think the story is probably true.

  The mayor, Henry Impey was smuggled out of Luton never to return. So a result there for the returned servicemen!

  Many Luton folk had their holidays cancelled by landladies not wishing to accommodate such riotous people.

  BW Roy (A Riotous Lutonian)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I have often spent an idle few minutes waiting to get on at court at Luton County Court looking at historic pictures of Luton in the corridor, one of which shows the results of this riot. I had not realised that the rioters were veterans.

Incidentally 3 months is pretty lenient compared to today - sentences for such an event would be measured in years not months if it happened now. Whilst length of sentences has undoubtedly got considerably longer in the last 20 years or so, I wonder if this sentence, in part, reflects the courts having some sympathy with the rioters?

[Guest Simon Bull]

I was gutted to see the "National Bank" memorial in pieces. How can such things be allowed to happen in this day and age of the enshrinement of "period features" in buildings?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I was very intrigued to hear that this was found at the Florence Nightingale Hospital. It was never explained how it got there.

[Terry_Reeves]

Roy

Re: Luton Town Hall. Not sure if your aware of it, but there is a book on the subject "Where they Burnt the Town Hall Down" by Dave Craddock. I have a copy and it's a good read.

Terry Reeves

[Guest Simon Bull]

Whilst I enjoyed the programme I found it just a little "flat".

Ian Hislop had to ask leading questions to get reactions from interviewees and the lack of explanation of the research process was unsatisfactory.

[Martin Brown]

Very proud to see the Sharp Street memorial in Hull on the programme. We have 4 members of the family featured. Last Christmas when I was up with my relatives I spent a morning cleaning it and my cousin had tried to removed the graffiti.

[ianw]

I have a certain sympathy with Simon's criticism. Some of the interviewees were indeed a bit dull. But I suppose it was an honest effort.

I was amazed to see the survival of the Hull shrines - complete with new graffitti of course.

My disapproving 14 year said "They must all be chavs in Hull"

[Tom Morgan]

After a prompt from me the Production Secretary has written back a pleasant enough email to say that any information that Dennis and I had provided, if used, will be in the third programme of the series to be broadcast on the 4th December focusing on women during the Great War. I just wish that their communication skills had been a bit better.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I got a letter from the production company today, as a matter of fact. Some months ago I spent a couple of days filming a "voyage of discovery" type of thing, meeting the relative of a Zeppelin raid victim and helping her piece together what had happened to her grandmother. Today's letter tells me that they aren't going to use the film, as Channel 4 has "asked us to refilm the story so that it was Ian Hislop doing the discovering."

This goes out on 4th December. It'll be interesting to see if Ian H uses my "buried" footage as his script!

Tom

[brownag]

Here’s a full list of the names on the broken memorial

National Bank Memorial

Great War Names

Andrews, EJ

Barnard, A

Barrett, MJ

Buckeridge, EG

Chapman, RGA

Clery, JF

Clifford, EW

Clifford, RW

Dixon, JE

Downing, HFM

Dutton, FJW

Ede, EW

Fitzgibbon, JJ

Harding, JG

Haywood, ST

Holbrook, RD

Keogh, FBJ

McGrane, PL

Merryfield, WLR

Neighbour, LG

Ockenden, HS

O'Connell, DC

Parker, FH

Penfold, HC

Sayers, CR

Shearman, A

Surgey, TG

Tardif, VSA

Underhay, GJ

Webb, TFC

Westbrook, JM

William, O

Second World War Names

Alen, PL

Banks, RP

Cleere, RP

Forde, EG

Horgan, CJ

Moreton, CHV

Murphy, GM

Phillips, HS

Reynolds, PL

Ryan, TB

Smith, HG

Smith, JT

Thomas, CP

Walker, TH

Wright, SG

[Guest wrinklyone]

the lack of explanation of the research process was unsatisfactory.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I felt that the low key approach was just right. So many progs dramatise instead of letting the subject matter speak for itself. But I do agree about the research process. Those progs in the series 'Who do you think you are?' also make it all look far too easy. That bloke Nick Barratt has got himself a nice little business!

[roy litchfield]

Terry,

Yes I have read the book by Dave Craddock, in fact I bought it for my mother. It will be interesting to see if Ian Hislop does include the Luton riot, so far he has only mentioned it on Parkinson.

BW Roy

[Ludovica]

C4 Now.. Still time to catch the second half of part two of this great series

[jemimajane]

Enjoyed the programme last week - my only complaint is that part 2, is not on until 11.35 p.m.tomorrow evening on S4C (Wales channel 4)

[Ludovica]

Another very good program, although slightly "bitty". Again an explanation of how the various relatives were traced would have been a good addition, but all in all, excellent. I didn't previously know about Walter Tull, or the others, but Horace Iles is an "old friend"