Remembering Ryedale’s War Dead
Rosemary Collins discovers how Ryedale Family History Group has researched the stories behind local war memorials
Almost every town and village in Britain has war memorials commemorating the local men who were killed in the service of their country, particularly in the First and Second World Wars. Many family and local historians have researched the stories behind the names, but Ryedale Family History Group (RFHG) in North Yorkshire has taken its research a step further. Earlier this year, the group published its 20th book about the stories behind local war memorials, this one focusing on the memorials in Gate Helmsley, Upper Helmsley and Warthill.
The series of books began in 2010, with a £47,400 grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund (now the National Lottery Heritage Fund), as part of an RFHG project called ‘Looking Back But Moving Forward’, which also involved transcribing parish registers. The first two books, for Hovingham and Helmsley, were published in 2011. The original project ended in 2014, since when the sale of books has attempted to make the project self-sustaining. More than 40 memorials featuring almost 500 names have now been researched. Each book contains a foreword by a prominent local person, descriptions and photographs of the memorials, and biographies of those commemorated, with the information that the researchers found out about their lives and deaths.
Volunteers carried out the research using websites such as ancestry.co.uk, findmypast.co.uk, fold3.com and forces-war-records.co.uk, as well as regimental histories, War Diaries and visits to The National Archives at Kew. In some cases local people were able to share photographs and memories of those killed in the Second World War, while the Commonwealth War Graves Commission supplied memorial certificates for those who are commemorated in its cemeteries and memorials.
Project leader Peter Braithwaite reveals one of the challenges: “There is no nationally agreed formula for deciding whose names should appear on a memorial, nor a format for the names. For example, some memorials have a simple ‘J Smith’, while others give a full name and regimental details, which was much more helpful for our researchers.”
Those commemorated include everyone from farm labourers to the sons of aristocratic families. There were also two women among the dead from the First World War – Sarah Jennings, a munitions worker who was killed in an explosion at a munitions factory in Barnbow in 1916, and Winifred Coates, a Voluntary Aid Detachment nurse who fell ill serving in Malta then returned to London where she died. Peter adds: “For some researchers, the process became an emotional experience. Some were moved to visit the Western Front and the great national memorials at Menin Gate, Tyne Cot and Thiepval, seeking some of the Ryedale men who had no known grave, or to visit the numerous war-grave cemeteries scattered around the French and Belgian countryside. Also, some Second World War men were from RAF Bomber Command, which prompted a group visit to the International Bomber Command Centre at Lincoln in June 2019, where we were able to put some of our research into their archives.”
‘For some researchers, the process became an emotional experience’