You’ve just read how my family treat me as an object of fun when talking about war memorials but I felt I must tell you how it all started.
My daughter, yes its her fault! She had the opportunity after graduating to work for nearly 6 months in China. She was to work in Tianjin University teaching the young trainee pilots English – I sometimes call her Miss Chips, as she had lots of pupils and all boys!
John Henry MacDougall Scott – old Etonian KIA WW2
And with only a couple of weeks notice she packed all her belongings and I do mean ALL! We took her to Heathrow where she met her fellow ‘teachers’ and off she set – leaving us with only Skype to communicate with.
We stayed for the night in Windsor and walked down to Eton – it was the holidays and very few students were left boarding. Firstly, I was taken by the Quad – I’d seen it on many a film but looked different in reality. Anyway, we wandered around the outer edge, under the covered area that surrounds the central courtyard, and there were memorials galore but at this stage they were just memorials. We took pictures, as you do, of them, finished our walk around and left. Leaving for home later in the day.
By this time Wakefieldfhs.org.uk had been going for about 5 years and was mainly transcripts that I gathered along the way, a series of links and other useful info for people with a Wakefield connection. Eton was out of the remit of the site so Genealogyjunction was born!
What to do with these pictures – memorial, glorious in their remembrance of fallen Etonians. I started to think and that can be lethal and cause work for some people. The transcriptions started, names on a white page – but who were these men, young and not so young, some ones son, husband or brother. A name meant nothing, these men had to come to life, have parents, a place to live, a job they did and a final resting place.
The great monster was born and over the years ‘life’ has been given back to many a man who thought it would be over by Christmas and those whose fight was over only a short time before November 11 at 11am.
….When you go home tell them of us and say, for your tomorrow we gave our today…
www.genealogyjunction.org.uk – memorials and other transcripts outside of the Wakefield area, Belgium and France