VC Souvenirs Stolen from Church

[Marc Thompson]

It is with sadness that I relate the following article in my local paper from last Friday:

'Villagers are baffled by the theft of rare memorabilia chronicling the life of a World War I hero who won the Victora Cross.

A wooden cabinet containing treasured historic documents and photos that once belonged to VC holder bombardier Fred Luke have been stolen from St John's Church, Lockerley (Hampshire).

Villager Madge Arthur - who Fred handed the momentoes to for safekeeping about 23 years ago - said she could not believe anyone could carry out such an un-Christian act and the theft was the loss of important pieces of the village's history.

"Fred's life story was in that book. He gave it to me when he opened our carnival and fete. It's very sad. It was Lockerley's history and Fred's history. I will never be able to understand how somebody could do such a thing."

Lockerley's vicar James Pitkin is also mystified by the theft. "At first I thought someone might have moved it to clean it, but it failed to turn up. I came here at the end of June. It was here then but not at the Remembrnace Day service."

Lockerley-born Fred died in Scotland on March 12, 1983. He moved to Scotland after he married at the end of the Great War but regularly returned to the village of his birth.

Fred was decorated with the V.C. for his gallantry at the Battle of Le Cateau in France on August 26th, 1914 when he was serving with the Royal Horse Artillery.

He and two other soldiers (Driver J.H.C Drain and Capt D. Reynolds) came under heavy fire as they saved the guns of the 37th Battery from the advancing German infantry. All three received the V.C. '

As far as I am concerned Madge says it all above.

Marc

[Guest Pete Wood]

Sad news, Marc. But the items will probably turn up on eBay - where members of this forum will then forward the evidence to the authorities.

You may also have heard, Marc, that someone attempted to steal the panels from Captain Charles Seely's sarcophagus (in the Isle of Wight). His effigy has already suffered at the hands of a vandal who smashed the nose off with a hammer.

I am just waiting for the R101 airship items at Cardington Church to disappear.

But what's the answer?? CCTV in every church...??

[Terry]

There are times when I feel that the authorities should bring back the rack! To think that some lowlife would commit such an act. Thank God that Luke's VC was not there.

[Will O'Brien]

This is yet another sad reflection on the society in which we now live.........respect seems to be something which is all too often missing.......I do wonder however at the thinking behind leaving such items in a church, which in my experience and by their very nature, not the securest of places.

[Guest Hill 60]

Villagers are baffled

To be honest, I don't see why they should be baffled. There seems to be a trend nowadays that nothing is sacred, and the urge to make a quick buck overrides people's common decency.

I wonder how long it will be when we see the whole-sale theft of war memorial plaques from inside churches

A couple of weeks ago I was at an arms fair when I saw (and I forgot to take the details!) a brass memorial plaque. It commemorated a high-ranking officer who had died in (IIRC) the 1950's, and was a good quality item. I didn't see it later in the day, so I don't know if the seller had hidden it or sold it. In hindsight, I should have asked where it came from, it wouldn't have suprised me if it was from a church.

[Ralph J. Whitehead]

It is sad to see that this trend appears to be everywhere. Some years back the revolver carried by Theodore Roosevelt in the Spanish-American War, was stolen from the locked case at the museum dedicated to him in Oyster Bay, New York.

It is something that can never be sold on the open market. Why take something you cannot sell or display. It never makes any sense to me.

Ralph

[BeppoSapone]

Villagers are baffled

To be honest, I don't see why they should be baffled. There seems to be a trend nowadays that nothing is sacred, and the urge to make a quick buck overrides people's common decency.

I wonder how long it will be when we see the whole-sale theft of war memorial plaques from inside churches

Plus ca change.....

Quite a few years ago someone stole the metal plates, listing the war dead, from the gate to a memorial garden in one Sussex town.

They were probably not sold on ebay, they were said to have probably been melted down for scrap.

[Marc Thompson]

Thank God that Luke's VC was not there.

In 1969 a duplicate VC medal for Fred Luke was put into circulation by a fraudulent dealer!

Interesting to read that Fred Luke apparently went on to have a British Army self-propelled gun named after him, the Luke Gun, in 1966.

Marc

[Garde Grenadier]

It is something that can never be sold on the open market. Why take something you cannot sell or display. It never makes any sense to me.

Yes, Ralph, it does not make sense to me either, but I suppose there are always nutcases who enjoy "having" things nobody else can look at, except themselves in their secret vaults, attics or cellars. Nothing is sacred anymore, very true! What can we do: try to teach people the value of our history, of certain buildings, memorials etc., last not least to appreciate the amount of thought, remembrance, love, pain and money that went into creating them??

Regards

Daniel