saint venant 1940-------farm boulet

[Verrieres]

Hello,
i know Tony is going to come along and add something shortly.In relation to the staffing and enquiries every CWGC enquiry is given a unique reference number to which is attached the information provided by whichever customer service representative was dealing with it so each time Tony has enquired even if he got someone completely different they would know exactly what had been passed previously.Short time,part time or whatever supervisors know the procedure if people were there to simply draw a wage then these people would not be in a job very long.The CWGC have a charter they have a code of practice but for as yet unknown reasons they are playing games not only with us but a lot more people and have done for years now.
We are constantly receiving totally false reports,information and mis information from all parties,how do we know this? because we are not your average `Joe Public` making an enquiry for a family tree. `Joe Public` makes an enquiry he is told by the CWGC or the Ministry of Defence "Your relative died..blah blah blah..in the battle of...Blah Blah Blah" and `Joe Public` believes this,why should`nt they after all the CWGC and the MoD are respected organisations.I am sure they receive more `Joe Public` requests than those from people like ourselves who have a little background knowledge so the CWGC and MoD send us the same error filled replies which we in turn question and question again but they keep rehashing the same old rubbish because in the vast majority of cases they either convince the enquirer that they have made a mistake or people simply give up and cease pestering them. Its tried and tested but in some cases there has been break throughs ie Tom Rodgers.
On the the CWGC site I failed to spot a glaring error which thankfully John picked up on it refers to this;-

In fact British troops continued fighting at St. Venant after the evacuation of Dunkirk,

No they did not so why has this been added? Perhaps this does not refer to the battle of St Venant at all? I believe the CWGC are refering to an action over 130 miles away at St Valery en Caux involving the 51st Highland Division who were indeed involved in fighting after the Dunkirk evacuation.
In relation to Forms Q the MoD and CWGC are `unfamiliar` with these forms ..as are the National Archives whose own researchers are `unfamiliar`with the term Form Q indeed the MoD in Whitehall wrote to Tony and said the only WW2 records of note they still retain are service records the other records being disposed of or destroyed a long time ago..do we believe them? `Joe Public` would I`m sure ,but we are not `Joe Public` and thank fully John has came up trumps again when he unearthed TS26/88 Repatriate statements on Form Q: Germany! Where is the France file hidden? Further down we find another file TS 26/224 which deals with Alleged German War Crimes;- La Bassee? Can they deny the existance of Form Q now ..of course they will!

Best

Jim

[Baconwallah]

I don't think there is a special 'France' file, Jim. There are only the "Germany, 'Japan' and 'Italy' files, so I would assume 'Germany' has to be read as 'The war with Germany'.

John

[Verrieres]

I don't think there is a special 'France' file, Jim. There are only the "Germany, 'Japan' and 'Italy' files, so I would assume 'Germany' has to be read as 'The war with Germany'.

John

Hello John,
Thanks for the clarification I was assuming they were the geographical theatres of war and not the actual `enemy` theatres .Cheers
Best
Jim

[ivor43]

hi all
.i am still in Cardiff at the moment on a new laptop so dont have access to notes. but i am sure that the ref that fighting continued in the area after Dunkirk.is in an official history, and may have come from
Frenchmans account. will check when i get back later today.


ivor

[Baconwallah]

but i am sure that the ref that fighting continued in the area after Dunkirk.is in an official history, and may have come from
Frenchmans account.ivor

Sorry, Ivor. The answers are:

No, it is not.
No it did not.

It seems Mr Andrews is confusing St Venant with St Valery-en-Caux, where the Highland Division fought on after the Dunkirk evac.

John

[ivor43]

Hi all.
First, Jim. An interesting post and i agree with most of what you have said. However there a number of points i am not sure about.
First, as you say we are not '' Joe Public '' and are not going to go away without answers. But in quoting the Tom Rogers example as a break through i am not so sure. As i understand this the Rogers Family were, like us, getting nowhere with MoD/CWGC until they were put in touch with M Faivre who appears to hold records that are NOT accepted by MoD/CWGC.
Now in order to investigate this further they would have had to accept the French files which appear to be from the 41/42 Field Grave Clearances, which they will not do. So in order to satisfy the Rogers Family have they allowed them a ''Buried near this Spot'' Memorial stone. This solved the problem.
But in our case that will not work so they appear to be somewhat more cooperative it is M Faivre that is not. Odd.
However i have a feeling that, in part, they may be telling the truth. I suspect that, for a couple of reasons, they may not have all the info, one being their not accepting the French Files. But, as i have said before, the facts as i understand them leads me to believe that Anthony is not in St Venant but in Calonne.
My 2nd point is with regard to this report that British troops were fighting in St Venant after Dunkirk i believe would have been quite possible. After the German breakthrough at Robecq the Germans pushed rapidly East and North to isolate Dunkirk. This i believe left a number of British troops isolated to the south of the Germans. would it not therefore be possible that they would then head for the St Venant area in trying to get to the coast.
The CWGC list for St Venant shows 15 men died between 30/5 and 1/6, OK i accept this may have been due to wounds but who knows.


Ivor

[dcdl12976]

i must admit i have wondered about some of the dates myself Ivor but i put it down to mistakes by grave registration or as you say died later of wounds.

[Verrieres]

Hi all.
First, Jim. An interesting post and i agree with most of what you have said. However there a number of points i am not sure about.
First, as you say we are not '' Joe Public '' and are not going to go away without answers. But in quoting the Tom Rogers example as a break through i am not so sure. As i understand this the Rogers Family were, like us, getting nowhere with MoD/CWGC until they were put in touch with M Faivre who appears to hold records that are NOT accepted by MoD/CWGC.
Now in order to investigate this further they would have had to accept the French files which appear to be from the 41/42 Field Grave Clearances, which they will not do. So in order to satisfy the Rogers Family have they allowed them a ''Buried near this Spot'' Memorial stone. This solved the problem.
But in our case that will not work so they appear to be somewhat more cooperative it is M Faivre that is not. Odd.
However i have a feeling that, in part, they may be telling the truth. I suspect that, for a couple of reasons, they may not have all the info, one being their not accepting the French Files. But, as i have said before, the facts as i understand them leads me to believe that Anthony is not in St Venant but in Calonne.
My 2nd point is with regard to this report that British troops were fighting in St Venant after Dunkirk i believe would have been quite possible. After the German breakthrough at Robecq the Germans pushed rapidly East and North to isolate Dunkirk. This i believe left a number of British troops isolated to the south of the Germans. would it not therefore be possible that they would then head for the St Venant area in trying to get to the coast.
The CWGC list for St Venant shows 15 men died between 30/5 and 1/6, OK i accept this may have been due to wounds but who knows.


Ivor

Hello Ivor,

The Rodgers family had what we seek the eyewitness account of Toms death from Pte Luke Bowden who saw Tom fall at the `other` bridge.The CWGC have the final say and this was swayed by the eyewitness report as the M .Faivre records could not be matched (according to `In Search of Tom`) with those of the MoD.As a result of the mis match Tom was denied a headstone over what M.Faivre identified as Toms actual grave. We find the eyewitness report of Anthonys death on the 29th May 1940 we find where hes buried.St Venant or Calonne we do not know but I still believe hes in St Venant,personal gut feeling nothing more.
The MoD and CWGC have not helped in the least to date? I`m not sure where you see they have M.Faivre has stated he knows nothing and the Cwgc and MoD continuously say they have nothing. What we are getting is mis-information there was no action in St Venant post Dunkirk (Today the CWGC agreed to re-evaluate their information regarding this yet its been on their website for years if John had not spotted it would it ever have been questioned?) this refers to St Valery en Caux which was where the Rodgers family were originally told Tom was killed(coincidence)
The dates quoted for men killed `between dates` bear no mystery these refer to last seen to body discovered these are assumed dates.Anthony Corkhill does not have an assumed date ,originally he did but this was ammended to 29th MAY 1940.There is no mystery regarding the date of death our mystery is where is the account of Anthonys death which enabled the date to be confirmed.Pension date 29th MAY 1940,Non Effective discharge DIED IN FRANCE 29th MAY 1940,Service records DIED 29th MAY 1940, CWGC Debt of Honour 29th MAY 1940.Landforces British Army DIED of WOUNDS 29th MAY 1940 and now Death Certificate Died of Wounds 29th MAY 1940 (Theres others)
The MoD remain silent whilst the CWGC state only one DLI casualty for the 29th MAY 1940..WRONG! Tony has questioned the latest update,I say update because it contained nothing new and nothing of relevance so we cannot call it information.
They replied with an admission that they are looking into their claims regarding the action post Dunkirk,they also admit they meant only one known DLI casualty in St Venant (Syd Walt which we told them) rather than a single DLI casualty that day they further state there were actually 7 DLI recorded as died on 29th MAY 1940 including Anthony. This is also wrong as there were 8 but we do not need to know this as only three were from the 2nd DLI , one Pte Clews died at home in Newcastle,so that gives us two Syd Walt and Anthony Corkhill (The other 5 were from the 8th,9th and 11th DLI fighting in another area) .The question of the number of unknowns also came into question there are 40 the CWGC quoted 50 theie explaination 10 are WW1 burials again we do not need to know this So why are we being given updates with even less information than we originally supplied them? The answer, this is how they normally respond to `Joe Public`tried and tested.
UPDATE
The CWGC had said a Corporal rests in the `unknown` grave next to Syd Walt they know he died in May but cannot confirm a date,strange as they have during past enquiries denied holding information on `unknown` soldiers,Tony to his credit has questioned this and been told today....we do hold records of all of the unknowns but information is limited (Hurrrrah are we getting somewhere)

Who filed the report confirming Anthony Corkhill died on the 29th May 1940, if his last official contact/sighting was on the 27th May 1940 by the RSM then this would have been used as an assumed date of death it was not,Anthony was never classed as missing he does not feature in any missing men file,there was no (known) correspondence his fate was known he is recorded as dead on the casualty list even before Syd Walt`s death was relayed back to the War Office even the Red Cross never enquired on behalf of the War Office(They made an enquiry at the request of the family).The Missing Men files, which I possess, have literally hundreds of enquiries sent out to comrades serving all around the world in an effort to determine the fates of Anthonys fellow Durham Light Infantrymen missing during the period 10th May-Evacuation,hundreds of letters and replies but not one solitary letter enquiring about Anthony Corkhill ....why?....Its my honest belief he was never missing !

Best
Jim

[ivor43]

Hi all.
I will not make any comment on this,yet, but this link makes interesting reading.

http://books.google.com.mt/books?id=ZM71HK2ysoAC&pg=PA293&lpg=PA293&dq=St+Ven ant+may+1940&source=bl&ots=KTTQ_pcwOt&sig=1MBMgJsf fK1G9U5VZGwpK_nIR4Q&hl=en&sa=X&ei=d1KBUe-vKITZ4AT1qYHIAQ&sqi=2&ved=0CGEQ6AEwCA#v=onepage&q= St%20Venant%20may%201940&f=false

A somewhat different version of events.Hmm.

I think the author of the book from which this is taken, Dunkirk: Fight to the Last Man.needs no introduction.


ivor

[dcdl12976]

So the brigade commander put the brigade on the south of the canal instead of the north which seems to back up what the FOO told my dad about the artillery strike though of course it relates to the 27th where as dad said they were hit on the 24th and the date of death of his mate says the same.