Church Open Day 23rd December

Just wanted to tell anyone who doesn't know that St James Church is having an event on Sunday 23rd December at 3pm. It will be a chance to look around inside the church to see how the work is going and learn a bit more about the history of the building.  Weather permitting, I will be there with the plank from the memorial and my files about the men on it, I'm hoping I'll have the chance to chat to anyone interested in the project and wouldn't it be great if we could find some more relatives of the men named on the memorial?

There will also be a bit of carol singing, mince pies and mulled wine to get us all in the Christmas spirit. Should be very festive and fun.

It will also be very cold so if you're going to join us please wrap up warm!

Posterity

This blog has been accepted by the UK Web Archive, that means that if something happens to the blog a copy of it will be available and freely accesible in the digital archive.
It takes a while to be processed but once it's done my research and the information about the memorial and the men on it will be preserved "for future generations"

If you have a website or blog which you think is worth preserving it's free and easy to apply on their website.

http://www.webarchive.org.uk/ukwa/

article about the memorial fragment

You can read an article about how the piece of the memorial was found, identified and returned to Liverpool here:

http://www.leicestershirevillages.com/barrowuponsoar/solving-the-mystery-of-barrows-p.html

The War Memorial Reredos and Roll of Honour Panel

Last week I got to see inside the church for the first time and saw the remains of the reredos in the chancel... I noticed that the carvings on it were identical to the war memorial and that shed some light on something that had been bothering me...

Recently I was sent a copy of a history of the church written in 1925 by Rev C.T. Dawson. In this the Rev. Dawson says that in 1920 'The War Memorial Reredos and Roll of Honour Panel were erected and dedicated.' In the same book he referred to my photo of the War Memorial as the Roll of Honour Panel.

I realised that I had been misunderstanding the inscription on the War Memorial - the reference to 'this reredos' is in fact to the full reredos in the church - the Roll of Honour Panel which I have been researching was not part of the reredos.

This doesn't affect my project but does significantly increase the impressiveness of the St James War Memorial. Here is a photo of the War Memorial Reredos from 1971, the Roll of Honour Panel was attached to the wall on the left, out of the photo. 

And here is a photo of what was left by about 1995:

Not too bad considering the amount of vandalism and fire-setting that had gone on over the years. The church was made more secure in 1998 and extensive work was carried out between 2000-2002 to get it ready to open again.
However, the next available photograph, from 2000 shows this:

Most of the detailing from the central panel has gone, including the top, and all 4 of the side panels are gone.
I can't find any reference to it being stolen or taken away for safekeeping so it's a bit of a mystery. I'm hoping to find out. The ogee arch in the middle was broken and later reattached so it's likely at least some of the decoration was lost to vandalism but it seems more likely to me that the large side-panels were removed and stored.

I'll update you when I know more!

BBC filming

For those of you who received my newsletter update, the filming with the BBC went well this week and I got to see inside the church for the first time (yay!)

I'm told that the piece won't be used before remembrance day now, I'll let you know when I hear anything.

If anyone would like to receive the newsletter please email me thewarmemorial@gmail.com they will be sent out whenever I have anything newsworthy so you won't be inundated with emails!

Amanda

I was on the radio!

For anyone interested in hearing me talking about the memorial, I was on the Radio Merseyside Breakfast Show yesterday. It's available on the BBC iPlayer for 7 days so you'll have to hurry!

Here's a link to the show, it's about 2h 25mins in

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00zwnpt

Rev. Short mentions an open day in the interview, that's going to be at St James' Church on 23rd December at 3pm with a carol concert and mince pies etc afterwards. If you're interested in having a look at the inside of the church, finding more out about its history or having a chat with me about the memorial project please come along (and wrap up warm, there's no heating!)

Naval casualties on St James' Memorial

The table below details the men on the St James Memorial who died serving with the Merchant Navy, the Royal Navy or the Naval Reserve. The information given is the service they were in, their service number (if applicable) the ship or base they were on when they died and ther date of death.

Name	Surname		Service number	Ship/base	Date of death
Herbert Loyd	Hill	Merchant Navy		SS ARABIC	19/08/1915
Samuel J	Tonkies	Merchant Navy		SS ARTIST	27/01/1917
Owen	Owen	Merchant Navy		SS STUART PRINCE	22/03/1917
William	Elliott	Merchant Navy		SS HUNTSTRICK	08/06/1917
Ernest C	Benn	Merchant Navy		SS OLYMPIC	20/03/1918
James	Tonkies	Merchant Navy		SS BURUTU	03/10/1918
Richard W	Longmaid	Merchant Navy Reserve	763081	HMS ALCANTARA	29/02/1916
William	Beattie	Royal Navy	SS/107737	HOWE BN	04/06/1915
Thomas H	Bramwell	Royal Navy	233784	HMS INVINCIBLE	31/05/1916
James	Wilding	Royal Navy	SS/110409	HMS INDEFATIGABLE	31/05/1916
Matthew	Chisam	Royal Naval Reserve	2062D	HMS PRESIDENT III	24/09/1917

St James Memorial, the men of other regiments than the KLR

This table lists the men on the memorial who were in regiments other than the KLR. When there is a star by their regiment it means that they also served in the KLR.

The information given in the table is their name, number, battalion, regiment and date of death. They are organised chronologically by date of death.

Name	Surname	Regt’l number	Battalion	Regiment	Date of Death
John H	Fitzsimmons	2499	2nd	South Lancashire Regiment	07/01/1915
Edward	Burston	1544	2nd	South Lancashire Regiment	12/03/1915
Alfred J	Trafford	63668	86th Field Coy	Royal Engineers	01/11/1915
Charles	Stenson	16567	8th	East Lancashire Regiment	09/02/1916
George J	Mackarell	16027	8th	Yorks and Lancaster Regiment	01/07/1916
Allan	Dawson	2nd Lieutenant	22 Coy	Machine Gun Corps *	03/09/1916
Matthew	Jones	23830	4th	Grenadier Guards	25/09/1916
Charles	Schonewald	4525	1st/9th Bn	London Regiment (Queen Victoria Rifles)	01/10/1916
James	Llewellin	13831	1st Bn	Royal Welsh Fusiliers	26/02/1917
Samuel	Butler	11394	2nd	West Riding Regt	03/05/1917
William J	Keam	M2/131577	596th M.T. Coy	Army Service Corps	16/07/1917
Hugh L	Loughlin	685742	293rd Army Bde	Royal Field Artillery	06/10/1917
Thomas S	Reay	Lieutenant	3rd Bn attd 10th Bn	Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry	01/03/1918
Thomas J	Prichard m.c.	Captain	1st Bn	Kings Own Royal Lancaster Regt	28/03/1918
Alfred	Mortenson	2nd Lieutenant	59th Coy	Machine Gun Corps *	15/04/1918
Donald	Tuke	6865	18th	Australian Infantry	09/08/1918
Robert D	Corran	431911	3rd Field Survey Coy	Royal Engineers *	14/09/1918
John	Simson	141288	1st	Canadian Infantry	01/10/1918
William J	Jago	92269	D Btty 3rd Bde	Royal Field Artillery	04/10/1918
George J	Mallison	23612	2nd	Leicestershire Regt	13/10/1918
Frank P	Lloyd	76928	14thBn	Welsh Regiment	20/10/1918
Herbert	Ledger	35836		Army Ordnance Corps	27/10/1918
Herbert W R	Jeffes	211207		Royal Garrison Artillery	14/12/1918
Thomas	Hulme	184987	356th E and M Coy	Royal Engineers *	26/05/1919