Mystery plaque dumped in Hornchurch, Essex

Phil, in post #463 Pete Keane wrote:

"I have sent Sydney (brother) via Ian (nephew) a fair amount of questions, mostly to give us a picture of Doug Pegrums life - at the moment the plaque isnt my main issue, more putting the Pegrums in touch with Ed Lansdell, which will be a fine thing in itself, but I have included it in the info request!"

So hopefully we might get some indication of how or why Douglas is named on the plaque which in turn should go some way to confirming the original location.

 

Sorry guys, but the best we have is what we have already semi-guessed, Sydney can only surmise that it was a sports club Doug joined when in England.

Dougs parents, brothers and sisters did not escape Burma, and lived under Jap occupation for 3 years, in which time they had no word from Doug, they did not know until 1945 that he had died, and they only found out last week what happened to him.

I hope to put together Dougs story as it is known, and will post it here as a seperate freestanding thread, but fraid to say....it wont answer our question!

I have asked Drew if he has the War Diary for the 8th Bn for Lt Blower, but he does not.

Nobody said it would be easy......

Regards

Pete

 

That's great Pete, if a little disappointing that it proves no link to the sports ground.
Is there any indication so far of the oilcloth theory or how he came to be in the Tottenham area? I will be very interested to see your sumary of the Pegrum family's wartime history. What a great 'spin off' to this investigation.
Tragic that no-one in the family even knew Douglas had died until after the war, but such things happen in a global conflict. Nice to know that through everyone's efforts we can put together something for the family after all these years.

Noticed we have broken 500 posts now and still going strong!

Great work.

 

Looking back to Henry Davis I went through all 179 Davis Henry or H on CWGC but came up with nothing that hasn’t already been found. In fact Geoff and Chris found these on SDGW over a year ago now:

“Just checked SDGW. There are two Henry/Harry Davis in Walthamstow (born or resident)”
From Geoff501 5/3/10.

Henry Davis – “Searching SDGW with keyword Edmonton, found 1 hit (not entirely helpful now, as other will need to be eliminated)
Henry Frank Davis
Born Holloway
Lived and enlisted - Edmonton
40786 9th Essex
Formerly 21154, Royal Fusiliers
KIA 30 Apr 1917”
From tmm 8/3/10.

The CWGC entry is:
DAVIS, HENRY FRANK. 40786 Private, 9th Bn. Essex Regiment.
Died 30/04/1917.
Bay 7. ARRAS MEMORIAL

No mention of former service with Royal Fusiliers.
So if anyone has the time or resources to have a look at Henry Frank Davis of Edmonton that would be very helpful. If no luck with him I guess we should next try Geoff’s two guys from Walthamstow.
Did anyone search SDGW with Tottenham as a keyword?

 

If I remember correctly (which I probably dont), I believe I searched every WW1 name on that plaque, along with keywords, edmonton, tottenham, enfield, waltham etc. I'm fairly sure for Henry Davis, that one was the only hit I had for Tottenham and the surrounding areas.

By no means a thorough search, but I think the above chap is probably worth trying to investigate.

 

Totally agree Chris, for some reason (probably my fault) this one seems to have slipped the net. It does seem a prime target for a little more research as it seems to be the only Henry Davis so far with a link to our 'target' area. Geoff's two with a Walthamstow link are secondary suggestions and I don't think anyone has looked into them either.
Just goes to show I should have reviewed the '17 files' more often!

 

Here he is in 1911

 

and 1901

I believe this is him, everything seems to fit. Concerning the name, having looked at the image, the family is split over 2 pages. The second d in Davids has been crossed out on the second page.

Also the street they are living is about 2 terraces from the 1911 house.

 

That's interesting Chris, just did a quick Google search and it appears Tottenham was quite an area for coal merchants due to it's excellent rail connections. There were many coal yards and merchants listed in the immediate area, but I suppose that would equally be the case in many areas at that time.
Duckett Road and Stanhope Gdns are very close to Haringey Green Lanes station.

 

Just a quick update on Doug Pegrum.

Sydney Pegrum has spoken to his family over the last few days, his sister believes that their father told her that Douglas was living in Epping, Essex.

If that is the case, then it is in line with other men on the memorial ie Waltham Abbey is a short distance away.

I think Oxford was a red herring, Epping works much much better.

I have posted a question here about RAF records, in particular a Form 280, apparently it would give his address on joining up. Sydney doesnt have one, but maybe the RAF do.

Pete

 

Interesting, another Pegrum here, thanks to GraveFinder General Chris Harley.

IN FROM THE COLD - Brookwood Memorial (WW2)

 

Hi Geoff, that is interesting, thanks.
Wonder if Pete Keane can find out if he is from the same branch of the Pegrums through his contacts with the family?

 

I will ask.

Pete.

 

Not to their knowledge.

Do I get an award for longest time taken to answer?

Not much progress recently - moved house and struggling to get any time on the forum.

Pete

 

Just had a thought (unusual for me).
If I saved the 17 individual files into a folder I could email it to a couple of regular contributors (Geoff, Pete, Chris?).
That way if I had a computer problem they wouldn't be lost and any recipient could also easily refer to the content for any given name.
I would prefer to remain as collator overall, and deal with updating the files but could send updated files to others occasionally as an ongoing 'back-up' system.
Any takers?
Popping out for a while - taking pics of Polish wargraves - catch you all later.

Mike

i know this in reply to an old post but if youre still in need of storage id be happy to do it for you. im a web designer, my wife has a ww2 memories site. id be happy to create a location (for storage). as you need to update things simply send them my way and i can upload for you.

 

Remembered today.

Pete.

 

Humphrey Garth's entry in 'List Of Etonians Who Fought In The Great War MCMXIV - MCMXIX'

C L. is the House Master, C. Lowry.

 

That's great Geoff, how did you find it (especially after all this time with little action on this thread)?

 

Mike, I downloaded a pdf book yesterday and dumped it in the usual place then noticed I had the Etonians book there, downloaded some time ago. So I looked up Garth. Did we check the college records, without going back over the posts I'm not sure. I think we did?

Any news on the future of the plaque?

Geoff

 

I found this story very interesting - is there any news on how this was resolved (if it has), please?