War Memorial Project Seeks Congregational Help

CHURCH congregations in Scotland are being asked to support a project identifying wooden memorial crosses for those who died in the First World War.

Scott Galloway, spokesman for the project, named The Returned, explained: “During the Great War the fallen had their graves marked with simple inscribed wooden crosses. In the early 1920s the Imperial War Graves Commission (now the Commonwealth WGC) after a programme of concentration, when outlying graves, allied graves in German battlefield cemeteries and the like were reinterred in IWGC cemeteries, set about replacing these markers with the now familiar Portland headstones.”In a number of instances the original wood markers were returned to families in the UK, some families went on pilgrimages to the Western Front (and other places) to retrievethem. The majority were placed in local churches, or church halls and some in private collections.

“Given that remains were not returned to the UK but buried where they fell, having something tangible close by must have been a great comfort to families who lost a loved one.”

Outlining the reason for the project, he said: “Almost 100 years later these markers still survive. The Returned is a project that a number of amateur historians are undertaking to record for posterity these surviving markers.”

Anyone with information about memorials of this type can contact Scott at scott@noble-scotland.co.uk to allow surveys to take place.

Results of the project’s work can be found on the internet at

http://thereturned.co.uk

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