Recent visit to the Somme. Took a comparison photo of the grave of K.J. Wade in Dartmoor Cemetery. Poppy Cross marks the grave.

Sorry John, couldn't resist.

Many thanks.

John,

thank you for posting this, I often stop of at this cemetery to visit all the lads, an interesting stop as it includes the oldest casualty, a father & son buried together, a VC winner and a SAD man.

Regards,
Scottie.

Rarely do some photos capture a moment of time, shots like this are quite something.

A brief moment in history - this is one that has it.

Cheers John.

regards

CT got your PM thanks. The morph is very good (as usual!). The 'old' photo, I find faintly disturbing in that I feel I want to move away lest the two aussies think I'm eavesdropping on them and their pal. I hope they made it home to tell the tale.

Scottie, thanks for comments. Was aware of the oldest casualty but not the others. Would you like to post details of all four for future reference, please? It might encourage visitors to the Somme to stop off at Dartmoor.

Cheers,
John.

John

The oldest casualty to die on the Western Front and buried in this cemetery is 68 year old lieut. Henry Webber. The father and son are Sergeant G and Corporal R F Lee killed on the same day in Sept 1916 whilst serving in the same artillery unit.
The VC winner is Private J Miller who won the award in Sept 1916 after carrying important messages although being severely wounded.
This information is from Martin and Mary Middlebrooks book 'The Somme Battlefields' There is no mention of the ' shot at dawn' soldier so hopefully Scottie can let us have this information.
Another interesting casualty mentioned is Lieut. Col. H Allardice who was killed on 1st July 1916 while commanding the 13th Northumberland Fusiliers but whose headstone has the badge of an Indian Army cavalry regt.

Regards, Roger.

John,
No probs, as you say would be nice to see more people aware and visit this site.

Roger,

thanks for adding your post and filling in a bit of detail, being 'Mr Picky' I understand that Lt Webber's stone may have been changed to show his age as 67 following recent research! Still quite an age to have been at the sharp end though!

The SAD is Trooper John Sweeney, he was apparently an Australian who enlisted in October 1914 into the Wellington Mounted Rifles, it is believed that he saw service in Gallipoli. He was SAD 2nd October 1916 for desertion.

A sad post script to this is that Sweeney's father committed suicide in 1925 as he was apparently informed that a public announcement re WW1 executions was to be made in NZ and his son would be named. He apparently lost another son KIA in 1918!

If my memory serves me correctly the grave next to Trooper Sweeney is a man holding the MM, I kind of like this as it shows the CWGC treating all these men equally!

Regards,
Scottie.

Thanks both for the info. Now have it tucked away in my Somme folder.
John.

John,

if you don't mind I will print off a copy of your photo to add to my file!

Regards,
Scottie.

You are welcome, Scottie.