FOR the small team involved with the War Memorial Families Project in Helensburgh, Remembrance Sunday this year will have added significance, despite the cancellation of traditional services throughout the country.
Having received a £10,000 grant from the National Lottery’s ‘First World War: Then and Now’ programme in May 2019, the four-strong group have spent more than a year painstakingly researching the 206 casualties of WW1 named on the cenotaph in Hermitage Park.
On Saturday, November 7, the culmination of that work to document the lives of the local men and women who gave the ultimate sacrifice will be revealed to the public through a brand new website, helensburghwarmemorial.co.uk.
Fiona Baker, chair of the Friends of Hermitage Park, said: “At times, the research has been heartbreaking, so many young lives lost, all over Europe and the Middle East as far as India.
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“We hope the website might bring forward some further information from the descendants of the local men, and one woman, remembered on the memorial.
“The altar at the memorial is inscribed ‘Let those who come after see to it that their names are not forgotten’, and we hope our project has honoured this.”
Ms Baker, along with fellow Friends Ann Stewart and Moira Griffiths-Cunningham, have poured blood, sweat and plenty of tears into the project in order to prepare biography pages for each First World War casualty listed on the memorial.
The website, built by Jim Chestnut, was originally scheduled to launch alongside a DVD, pamphlet guide and memorial book but the latter has been postponed until Armistice 2021 when public gatherings will, hopefully, be permitted.
Fiona added: “It has been emotional for all of us at times, but this is not really surprising considering the subject matter.
“It is impossible not to be moved reading the 206 names of the men who died in WW1 but we wonder who they were, about their lives and families, their dreams and aspirations, what their lives would have been had they not made the ultimate sacrifice.
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“We cannot make them live again but by recording their stories we can bring life to the names carved in stone, reach across time and deepen our community’s understanding and appreciation of their sacrifice and the impact that WW1 had in our town.”
The research for the project has brought to light the names of Helensburgh men, and men who are associated with Helensburgh, who died in World War One but whose names are not on the war memorial, most likely because families simply could not afford to pay for their inscriptions.
There are 206 names listed on the WWI panel on the memorial. The ‘missing’ names not included add a further 59 men to Helensburgh’s contribution to the Great War, making a total of 265 who made the ultimate sacrifice.
Ann Stewart said: “With only four of us working on this project, there has been an opportunity to get quite close to the men named on the memorial. At times we have all had tears in our eyes over the lives they led and their deaths.
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“There are always one or two that stand out. I felt for the lads who, having survived the war, died later. David Melville King, who came back from Rhodesia to fight, returned to his farm at Maradellas, Rhodesia (now Maronder, Zimbabwe) only to take his own life.
“James Spiers, who while being treated with electric therapy for shell-shock, died of an aneurysm. He is buried in Helensburgh Cemetery, not far from Edward McCormick, who died, along with his landlady, of pneumonia – the Spanish flu pandemic. It somehow seems so unfair after all they went through in the war not to see the peace.
“But another story which stands out is that of Duncan Patterson, who emigrated to Winnipeg, Canada. It took him two years to save enough to send for his wife and children.
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“Unfortunately, his unit of the Canadian Infantry sailed for England before she arrived and their ships passed so closely on the St Lawrence River that they could call to each other. He died at Lille leaving a wife and six children in Canada.
“There are so many stories on the new website, and we hope that where there are gaps, people will come forward with more information.
“It was a large project for so few of us, but it was worthwhile as it will be an archive for people searching for their ancestors.”
Moira Griffiths-Cunningham added: “As a serving officer for some years in the Royal Air Force it has been my privilege to work on this moving research.
“I was particularly struck by the number of Helensburgh-born men who had emigrated to various parts of the British Empire and who returned to enlist. By exploring their lives, families, work et cetera I believe we have helped to draw them out as individuals, and in doing so, have honoured their memory.”
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