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Memorial found in a skip

I now think it was Stoney Lane which was bombed - next to barracks so it would make sense. Hence their registers stop 1940. They joined Moseley Road rather than the other way round - again makes sense as they were in brackets!
 
Janice,

Yes, the clip above says a land mine destroyed the church and its school in 1945. And as this clip from the Daily Post of 20 May 1954 states, Moseley Road church was sold, possibly for warehousing, though I haven't found a report of a fire yet.
Moseley Road Cong sale.jpg
EDIT: No reports of a fire. Whoever bought it, probably a developer, just demolished it. Currenly the Ex-Catalogue Clearance Centre, a newish two storey shopping development.

Maurice
 
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Although I haven't really contributed to this thread I have followed it with great interest. It's really amazing what teamwork can do and I know that the answer is just around the corner.

Janice, I've long been puzzling over "War Hs" in your post #115 - did you ever find out what it meant? I wondered at first whether it was Warwick Hospital but having given it more thought and a bit of googling I think it was War Hospital although I'd never heard of a War Hospital. Apparently those buildings, taken over from other uses such as asylums, were call War Hospitals, I suppose meaning that they were solely for the use of the war injured.
 
Thanks for that Penny - I am glad it was not a badly written "workhouse" - I am sure they used Birmingham University and also Joseph Chamberlain's Highbury amongst others.
 
Not sure how this forum works, just joined.

The plaque is definitely originally from Moseley Road Congregational Church. It was proposed in 1917 by the father of Sidney Currie Betts, of the 7th Rifle Brigade, who died on 15th April 1917. The church decided to wait until the end of the war before erecting a memorial.

The church magazine of January 1920 lists 30 names of those killed in the war. 25 are on the memorial, which was unveiled the following year (3 were still alive, one seems to have been mistaken for someone else, and one is untraced). There are several misspellings in the magazine list.

There is at least one misspelling on the memorial - A. Pepperill was Alfred Pepperell RAMC 104911 of 233 Grange Road Kings Heath. He had a certificate from the St. John's Ambulance Brigade. He worked for the Birmingham branch of the Liverpool, London and Globe Insurance Company before the war. After enlisting on 19th November 1915, he served in France for three months. Alfred was on the Hired Transport (troopship) Transylvania which was torpedoed on 4th May 1917 in the Mediterranean en route to Egypt. There were thousands of men on the ship, and 300 were lost. Survivors were picked up by a Japanese destroyer (an ally in the war). Among those who were presumed to have died drowned was Alfred Pepperell. Bodies of the dead in some cases floated both to Italy and to Spain, and the men are buried in those countries, but Alfred was not one such.

Alfred Pepperell is also commemorated at the Friends' Institute, Highgate, on the Birmingham Central School memorial (now at Byng Kendrick school) and at All Saints', Kings Heath. His brother Raymond served in Mesopotamia with the Dorset Regiment.
 
thanks wam im not sure if mr rolfe is aware of this forums input but it would be nice if he could share what he has found so far as it will help this forums research... we have done rather a lot in a short time...dont want to be going on a wild goose chase so to speak

thanks wam

lyn
I'm here now!
 
Welcome - a number of us have enjoyed working on your "puzzle" and hope we have contributed a bit. It has been a fascinating journey. We would be interested to know what other info you are still missing so we might be able to have a go at the missing pieces.

If you look here https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/forum/index.php?threads/erdington-postmen-heroes-remembered.43365/ you will see we have traced a memorial before - thanks to Astoness (Lyn).

As for how it works - post a request for help and members will chip in - you can then decide what is relevant. The site covers all sorts - trivial and serious.
 
This may be irrelevant now that the origin of the plaque may be about to be unveiled (interesting! ), but I think the church that you are referrring to as demolished, Viv, is the Anglican church of Christ Church, Sparkbrook. Church of Christ, Moseley Road, was United Reformed. Awaiting the answer!
Just to say that it (the answer) was never held back
In the Birmingham Daily Post for July 1918 Harry is posted as missing. The list says he died in June, so maybe later than July they received the sad news. RIP

View attachment 127741
Harry Boucher was aged 19 when he was killed in France, the date being designated as the 11th June 1918. He had been reported missing, and had been in France for three months, as above.

He was Private 42274 in the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Berkshire Regiment. Harry was 19 when he died. His mother was Mary Ann Boucher, of 67 Sherbourne Road, Balsall Heath.

Harry Boucher has no known grave and is commemorated on the Soissons Memorial, Aisne in France.
 
Welcome - a number of us have enjoyed working on your "puzzle" and hope we have contributed a bit. It has been a fascinating journey. We would be interested to know what other info you are still missing so we might be able to have a go at the missing pieces.

If you look here https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/forum/index.php?threads/erdington-postmen-heroes-remembered.43365/ you will see we have traced a memorial before - thanks to Astoness (Lyn).

As for how it works - post a request for help and members will chip in - you can then decide what is relevant. The site covers all sorts - trivial and serious.
Thank you, it's been a rollercoaster since Friday when I got a message from a BBC reporter. The big breakthrough came when a man who has researched fallen WW1 soldiers from free (nonconformist/dissenting) churches got in touch - he has an enormous database. This was Saturday afternoon and he was away for the weekend. I checked it all out (including names listed as dead who did not appear on the memorial) . The final clincher (for me that is, I am a mathematician by background and have a very high standard of proof) did not come until yesterday morning when I saw this picture. 1539194050419.pngThe memorial is very similar as you can see and is in Carr's Lane. Nonconformist memorials tend not to have ranks etc (all being equal before God), nor is the quotation biblical (the Moseley Road quotation is from the Battle Hymn of the Republic).
 
This is what I wrote for the Stone family (I am in touch with several distant relatives):
Driver 820762 Alfred Theophilus Stone, Royal Field Artillery
Private 41174 Sydney George Stone, 1st Battalion Dorset Regiment
Lance Corporal 203553 William John Stone, Rifle Brigade

The three sons of Alfred Stone, a carpenter, were all born in Balsall Heath, the family living in Brunswick Road and then Edgbaston Road, and later in Vincent Road. Two daughters, Annie and Alice, completed the family.
Their mother, also Annie, died in 1906, and Alfred married Nellie Long (the boys' Sunday School teacher). Alfred, the eldest son, moved out and worked as a piano frame maker. Sydney worked as a baker’s assistant.
This heartbreaking notice appeared in the Birmingham Mail in November 1918, just before the Armistice:

William has no known grave and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial.
Sydney is buried in the Sequehart British Cemetery No. 2 in Aisne in France.
Alfred Stone, the surviving brother, had married Louisa Warden in 1913, with son Alfred being born the next year and son Sydney in 1915. Alfred had enlisted in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment in September 1914, but was discharged after three weeks on medical grounds. However, he later joined the Royal Field Artillery as a Driver (not what it seems at first sight, a Driver worked with, looked after and rode the war horses which pulled the guns).
Alfred survived the fighting, and was due to be demobbed. On pre-demobilisation furlough, Alfred died in Dudley War Hospital on 3rd July 1919, from bronchitis and heart failure. His widow Louisa received £6 17s 3d from his effects, and a War Gratuity of £23 10s was invested in the Post Office Savings Bank on behalf of his children.
 
Welcome - a number of us have enjoyed working on your "puzzle" and hope we have contributed a bit. It has been a fascinating journey. We would be interested to know what other info you are still missing so we might be able to have a go at the missing pieces.

If you look here https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/forum/index.php?threads/erdington-postmen-heroes-remembered.43365/ you will see we have traced a memorial before - thanks to Astoness (Lyn).

As for how it works - post a request for help and members will chip in - you can then decide what is relevant. The site covers all sorts - trivial and serious.
Many thanks, the mails are coming in all the time so if I don't have the answers I'll ask here!
 
Fabulous to see this puzzle solved! Well done, and great to see all the information about the individuals concerned, too.

I wonder why so many of the men seem to have identified with denominations other than Congregationalists. I could understand more if they were all from other Free churches, but weren't there RC and Anglicans there, too?

Another question, when you have time, Rob (!)... any idea on where the plaque was between the church's demolition and its discovery on that skip?
 
Rob - just a couple of questions. The plaque in #331 contains the name "Carrs Lane Church" - the plaque you were researching has no "church name" - did your contact have any idea whether it was common to have the name of the Church or not? Secondly - do we know why these names are on a congregational plaque?
 
Thanks for that Penny - I am glad it was not a badly written "workhouse" - I am sure they used Birmingham University and also Joseph Chamberlain's Highbury amongst others.

Janice, sadly there were so many wounded that they commandeered many large buildings including workhouses. An interesting point I thought (although, sorry, slightly off topic) was why some of the men were treated in hospitals many miles from home. This was because, as the war progressed, hospitals began to specialise in different injuries and the men were sent to the best place for each of them, I hadn't realised this.
 
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Hollymore and Rubery hospitals were also utilised as war hospitals. I think the wounds likely to be encountered were so different from the wounds normally treated in normal hospitals that the expertise was concentrated in places not too far from, and with good rail links to, ports where the wounded were originally received .
 
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