The Launton Lads Who went to War

The following text is Chapter 1 'About this Book' from the book by Pat Tucker.

It was published in 1996 and is no long available to purchase. Any new information would be welcomed, and if there is sufficient interest, then an online version may become available to purchase, with new information added since first publication.

On September 3rd 1995, a war memorial was dedicated to the men of Launton who gave their lives in the service of king and countryduring the two world wars.

Many people attended the service of dedication that dayand, since then, many more have stopped to read the long list of names. Most have surely asked themselves - who were these men? how old were they when they died? when and where were they killed? were the two men named Butler related? were the two named Simons brothers? and what about the four men named Castle?

Over the years, the members of Launton Historical Society have undertaken various projects which had resulted ina scatter of information about the men who had died in the two world wars. With the reection and dedication of the war memorial and the amount of interest it stimulated, Launton Historical Society members decided that the time had come to bring together this information
and then to assemble short biographies of each man. our intention is that these men should be remembered not just as a list of names carved in stone, but as flesh and blood, as someone's son or brother, as a child at the village school or as a young man taking up his first job before being sent to fight for his country

From surveys fo the monuments (including the rolls of honour) in Launton Church and Chapel and the two graveyards, we knew that tow World War I victims had been buried here (E R Jeacock and Arthur Penn): that the deaths of another three were recorded on the gravestones of net-of-kin (T B Brown, H C Castle and G Freeman): and also that there is a memorial to a Canadian pilot (Frank L Turner, killed in 1941) in the church, but no clue as to what connection he had with Launton.

Firstly we had to establish the identities of the men named on the war memorial. Many Launton residents who have lived here since the 1920s and '30s had known the three casualties of the secon world war, so they could tell us a great deal about these men. However, no-one living here today can recall much detail about the 1914-18 war, even the oldest residents would have been quite young at the time. Therefore we needed to look at documentary sources to find out who the world war one casualties were. The church resisters provided information about many of them - when they were baptised and who their parents were. The 1891 census yielded information about those born before April 5th 1891 - who their parents and siblings were, their ages and occupations, where the famil lived, etc.