Nine years ago, i was doing my best to help my daughter with her history project for school. I suggested that local history was a good place to start. I had not moved in to the area very long before so knew little myself, however a keen nose for history helped ! I realised very quickly that the centre of the old village was where the small library and churchyard are today, curious as to why there was no church i investigated the church yard and library first. On entering the church yard i noticed that the majority of names therein were of Perry or Cutler. One grave caught my eye as it was subsiding and visibly sinking in to the mud. scraping back the mud i could see the names of two soldiers inscribed along the side of their fathers grave, Walter and Roland Perry, more of these in a moment. The church was knocked down and rebuilt further up the road in the modern centre of Bartley green in the early 60's. I have to say no where near as nice as the old St michaels and all angels was. So far the school project was firing my imagination very well and i was in the library post haste. The library was built at the turn of the last century and is small and cosy, the village as was has changed very much in the course of time and is quite hard to imagine looking at it now. In the back of my mind i kept thinking of those soldiers names sinking in to the mud, who were they and what happened to them ? The mystery increased and when i saw the war memorial by the new church up the road i was disturbed to find no mention of them ? Why were they missing from it ? I did not have much to go on but i was determined to not let them fade from history and sink in to the mud again. I contacted the commonwealth war graves commision and asked for any info that they could send me, as i knew their regiments and service numbers i could also contact their units.
Turns out both were killed in action fifteen months apart, Walter is buried in flanders and Rolland is commemorated on the Menin gate as he no known grave. Why not on the memorial then ? Looking for more info i left messages on websites and also the university web page for B'ham ww 1 studies and had a nice reply from a chap called Paul Finnigan, who was also wondering why the names were missing as he was doing a thesis on the effects of the war and a study in to the memorials. Between us we pieced together a possible explanation. The original church stood in Field lane at the far end of the church yard where new houses were built in the 60's. From photographic evidence the war memorial was sited in the churchyard only about ten feet from the grave of the perry's father (James buried in 1910) The memorial was erected through public donations and not via official means, in the 1920's. Given the proximity to the grave it is likely that the perry family had the names of Roland and Walter added before the memorial was erected and in doing so ,it was maybe thought not neccesary to duplicate the names. Sadly this also almost lost them to history and deprived future researchers from finding them. We decided to do our best to rectify this and ensure that they would not be forgotten and should be remembered on the local war memorial.Through the stalwart efforts of Paul, the help of councillor Lines was sought and the plight of these brave men highlighted.After checking that our collective information was indeed correct, I am very pleased to say that after a short time and true to his word, the work was carried out and now anyone reading the names on the Bartley green memorial will see Walter Perry and his brother Roland.
From the small ammount of research i have done i know that they lived in Bartley green , were farm labourers and worked the land. although one address is in Harbourne, they enlisted in Selly oak.
Walter Perry ,private, 40839, 4th Battalion Worcestershire regmt, kia 30/09/18 age 24. Buried ,Haringhe (Bandaghem) Military Cenetery, Poperinge, West- vlaanderen, Belgium.
Roland Perry, private, Loyal North lancs regmt, kia 07/06/17(possibly at the battle of Messines) no known grave,commemerated on the Menin gate, Ypers.
If you can add any info to this please do so, If you are a relative i would love to hear from you and would very much like to see a photo of them.
Turns out both were killed in action fifteen months apart, Walter is buried in flanders and Rolland is commemorated on the Menin gate as he no known grave. Why not on the memorial then ? Looking for more info i left messages on websites and also the university web page for B'ham ww 1 studies and had a nice reply from a chap called Paul Finnigan, who was also wondering why the names were missing as he was doing a thesis on the effects of the war and a study in to the memorials. Between us we pieced together a possible explanation. The original church stood in Field lane at the far end of the church yard where new houses were built in the 60's. From photographic evidence the war memorial was sited in the churchyard only about ten feet from the grave of the perry's father (James buried in 1910) The memorial was erected through public donations and not via official means, in the 1920's. Given the proximity to the grave it is likely that the perry family had the names of Roland and Walter added before the memorial was erected and in doing so ,it was maybe thought not neccesary to duplicate the names. Sadly this also almost lost them to history and deprived future researchers from finding them. We decided to do our best to rectify this and ensure that they would not be forgotten and should be remembered on the local war memorial.Through the stalwart efforts of Paul, the help of councillor Lines was sought and the plight of these brave men highlighted.After checking that our collective information was indeed correct, I am very pleased to say that after a short time and true to his word, the work was carried out and now anyone reading the names on the Bartley green memorial will see Walter Perry and his brother Roland.
From the small ammount of research i have done i know that they lived in Bartley green , were farm labourers and worked the land. although one address is in Harbourne, they enlisted in Selly oak.
Walter Perry ,private, 40839, 4th Battalion Worcestershire regmt, kia 30/09/18 age 24. Buried ,Haringhe (Bandaghem) Military Cenetery, Poperinge, West- vlaanderen, Belgium.
Roland Perry, private, Loyal North lancs regmt, kia 07/06/17(possibly at the battle of Messines) no known grave,commemerated on the Menin gate, Ypers.
If you can add any info to this please do so, If you are a relative i would love to hear from you and would very much like to see a photo of them.
