Left To Grow Old

Left to Grow Old

Companion to Lest We Forget telling some stories of local men and women who served their country in the Great War and returned to their families

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Foreward by Jennifer, Lady Gretton JP, Lord Lieutenant of Leicestershire and County Patron of the Royal British Legion. Left to Grow Old is a companion to the Ibstock Lest We Forget book. The latter commemorates all the men who died during or as a result of WW1 and rightly so but they were only 9/10's of those that served their country when it came calling.

The Historical Society are compiling a database of those people that they've been able to trace and the names number close 1,000 but with so many service records burnt during the blitz of WW2 there are many names that we'll never know of their involvement. This was demonstrated by the discovery of a Roll of Honour at Congerstone School which unearthed another dozen names that we never knew about as they didn't serve abroad, claim a pension or were absent during the General Election of Easter 1918. However difficult it's been to trace men's involvement in the War its not even close to how difficult it's been to trace women's contribution where we've had to rely on family stories.

This time the villages of Bagworth, Ellistown, Heather, Ibstock, Nailstone, Newton Burgoland, Normanton-le-Heath, Odstone, Snarestone and Swepstone are joined by Congerstone and Shackerstone - it became obvious during the research that these two villages had close links with their neighbours to the north and so were included here.

The Ibstock and district branch of the Royal Briitish Legion will receive 50% of all sale proceeds, the other 50% will be going to the Historical Society to fund their educational projects. Special thanks go to the following organisations for their keen support and financial contribution to this project. Heritage Lottery Fund, North West Leicestershire District Council, Hinckley & Bosworth Borough Council, Holmsdale Manor Nursery, Eleete Auto Service Ltd, Safe Computing Ltd, Midland Quarry Products Ltd, Bloor Homes, Underwood Electronics, Halls Electricals, Heather Parish Council and the Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes.

Over 150 stories of local men and women from a cluster of 12 villages who served in a variety of roles during the war. They include

Eight of the extended Eggington family from Ibstock. John was the manager of Ibstock Co-op after the war and ran a field canteen until there was a call for it to stock alcohol. This went against his strict Wesleyan upbringing so he resigned his post in favour of running messages at the front - a week later a stray shell fell on the canteen.
His sister Fanny served as a Sister with the Red Cross and served on the Western front and in the Middle East despite being shot by a German snipper while attending the wounded in No Man's Land. She was awarded the Red Cross 2nd Class by the King.
Tom Lander also of Ibstock, would marry John's sister Sarah, served with the Intelligence Corps interogating captured German Officers.
Claude Vickers of Bagworth and Percy Jarvis of Ellistown both met their wives while serving with the Army. Percy would later become headmaster of Ravenstone Junior School.
Horace Harrett became Headmaster of Ibstock Junior School for 25 years and seldom mentioned his award of the Military Cross for conspicuous gallantry. Other headmasters include John Dronfield of Heather who became Headmaster of St Peters School in York.

Far from being a young mans game Josiah Cooper of Leicester Road Ibstock was 49 years old in September 1914 when he re-enlisted in the army, he had served 12 years with the Tigers in the 1880's .
Harry Dronfield of Heather was 17 and a half when he finally got to enlist with the RAF on the 21st May 1918, he passed Armaments school three weeks before the Armistice.
Thomas Underwood of Ellistown and Alty Adcock of Ibstock put their musical talent to good use while in uniform by to entertaining in the officers mess.
To relieve the boredom in the trenches, George Farmer of Ibstock used to perform card and magic tricks. Jabez Emmerson of Ellistown took a tiny bible and used to read pslams to those feeling the strain of living with the daily threat of death.
George Holt of Odstone, William Lockton of Ibstock and Jabez Emmerson were all awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal for their gallantry, Reginald Glover of Ellistown won the Military Medal. John Fox of Congerstone, along with Alfred Eggington, Horace Harrett and Reginald Moore, all of Ibstock, were awarded the Military Cross. Daisy Lardner of Ibstock was awarded the Distguished Service Bar while serving with the Land Army.

Their names may not appear on a War Memorial but many men paid an expensive price as victims of gas attacks or from maltreatment while a Prisoner of War. Frank Black was just 41, John Cooper was 53 and Alfred Jacques and Arthur Cooper were only in their sixties when they died, all were gas victims and all from Ibstock,
Arthur Griffin and Jack Lewis of Ibstock plus Ted Turner of Bagworth all lost a leg during the conflict and all had to adapt to life and work on crutches or a pegg leg, all with great success.
Alfred Eggington would be appointed Mayor of Loughborough. Bernard Newman of Ibstock was a celebrated author, Tom Lander became a Chief Inspector with Scotland Yard. Jabez Emmerson would have four collieries under his control and Reg Glover was the first coalminer to be voted Chairman of the Coalville Urban Council.
Charlie Bremridge and Wilf Redshaw, both of Ibstock came through their time in uniform relatively unscathed only to suffer serious injury, or in Wilf's case death, working in the mines.
The stories reveal the true identity of Santa Claus, proof that pit ponies could not only count but had long memories and why a school in York celebrates November 5th slightly differently.
Many of those featured have grand children and great grand children still living in the area.

Are you considering trying to trace ancestors who served in the Great War? hopefully below you'll find some tips, useful resources and web sites that might help you. There are specialist web sites for Forces Records but they tend to hold the same detail as the sites below which offer broarder record sets.

Ironically it's easier to find those that paid the ultimate sacrifice than those that survived. The most complete record set are maintained by the Commenwealth Wargrave Organisation listing all that's that died, www.cwgc.org, which has a search engine with name, Regiment, date and keyword search. Sometimes a casualty is listed with just an initial rather than Forename and this is where the keyword comes in handy to use parents names or where they lived however not all records have this.

So the person you're researching isn't listed on the GWGC, the next record set that we'd recommend checking is the Absent Voters List of 1918. The archive location various between different counties, In Leicestershire they are held at the County Records Office in Wigston. To access the Lists, join the CARN scheme which is free as long as you have some ID and a utility bill showing your address. (The CARN card gets you access to most of the County records offices in the UK). The AVL was completed for all men serving with their units away from home just prior to the General Election around Easter 1918 which means if your ancestor was at home around that time or yet to be called up then they won't appear on the list. The AVL will usually show where they lived at the time, their service number, what Regiment they were serving with, sometimes the Battalion and even occasionally the Coy they were with.

There is one set of records which is very complete and that is the Medal Card index which is widely available using various search sites. The Historical Society have access to both www.ancestry.co.uk and www.findmypast.co.uk and both have searches for the Medal Cards, each site has differing search criteria but we've found Find My Past has slightly better Military records. If you don't already have a subscription to these sites Find My Past have regular free periods available and Ancestry is searchable at most Leicestershire Libraries including the County Records Office. There are a couple of limitations that you need to be aware of with the Medal Cards, firstly they only cover army personnel and therefore Naval or Airforce records are in a different data set, secondly they are only searchable by name, service number and sometimes Regiment and therefore with out these three bites of data you could be searching a lot of records if all you have is the name Bert (Albert?, Bertie? Bertram?) Smith. Above all though is that your search subject had to have served overseas to have been awarded a medal and therefore if your subject served in one of the many Agricultural Coy's you're unlikely to find any medal card.

When you find a mans service record you will be rewarded with all kinds of data. The place and date of enlistment, had they served in any previous capacity, their immediate family details, which Regiments and battalions they served in, where they served and any periods of hospitalisation. The big problem with service records is few survived the blitz in WW2 - something like 20% at best survived, so if you find for your ancestor consider yourself fortunate. In addition to service records some men were able to claim certain benefits if they were injured or warranted a Pension and these records are normally available alongside service records.

Many Regiments maintain their own records and therefore if you know which Regiment your ancestor served with contact their Regimental Museum as they often have access to War Diaries (also available at selected Records offices). Most men were in the ranks and it's rare to find any named, this was preserved for officers but sometimes a name can be traced. Links to a number of Regimental Museums can be found at www.armymuseums.org.uk.

The final link is to the Great War Forum, www.1914-1918.invisionzone.com, where you will find some very knowledge and extremely helpful people, if the detail can be found it's here that you'll find someone to help - it's only polite to make sure that you say Thank You to those that helped.

Good Luck with your research.