The search that connects Chorlton with a British War Cemetery in the Netherlands

There is just an outside chance that there is someone who remembers Mr. and Mrs. Chetham who lived at Grindley Avenue in Chorlton.

The grave of Arthur Chetham, 2021, Nederweert

They were there from at least 1939 and possibly earlier, and it will be from there that their son Arthur went off war and Joyce, their daughter went off to be married.

She married Arthur Sutton in 1945, and may have stayed local.

I am not sure when her brother enlisted, or his early career in the army, but in 1944 he was in the 8th Battalion of the Royal Scots which was raised on August 2nd 1939.  This fits, because he was already away from the family home at the beginning of  September of that year. 

His battalion stayed in the UK until June 1944 when it landed in Normandy  and fought at the Battle for Caen in Operation Epsom,  and later at the Second Battle of the Odon and Operation Bluecoat. 

The battalion then fought in the North West Europe Campaign, from Paris to the Rhine, until the end of the war.

They entered Belgium in September, crossed the Rhine in March 1945, and advanced to Hamburg by the end of the war.*

Arthur was killed on October 31st 1944, between the villages of Asten, Liessel and Neerkant, during the advance through the Netherlands and is buried in the British War Cemetery at Nederweert.

I doubt I would ever have come across his story were it not from the appeal posted by Jürgen Beekers on social media asking for help to track down information on this young man who is one of 363 Commonwealth servicemen who buried in the Nederweert war cemetery.

Candles lit on Christmas Eve, 2020

Many of whom have been adopted by residents in the region around the municipality of Nederweert, which is co-ordinated by The Adoption Graves Foundation of the Nederweert War Cemetery, and involves visiting an adopted grave several times a year, which might be on the birthday of the dead serviceman and annually on Remembrance Day and Christmas Eve when candles are lit on the graves.

In the case of Private Chetham, there was little known, other than that he was the son of Arthur James Chetham and Edith Emily Chetham of Chorlton-cum-Hardy.

Jürgen’s appeal was successful and while we still do not know too much about Arthur, there is a better understanding of his family, and in the course of the next week we should know exactly when he was born, which will assist in commemorating his birthday in a simple ceremony at his grave.

And that brings me back to the hope that someone may know something of the family, and perhaps have a picture of our young soldier.

The position of Private Chetham's grave marked with a  red circle, 2021

Tantalisingly, there are a number of family historians who have included Arthur’s parents on their family trees deposited on the genealogical platform, Ancestry.

It may just be possible that these family historians have links to others who knew the Chetham’s.

And while I await developments I will track down a reference to Arthur in the Manchester Evening News, and research the regimental diaries of the 8th Battalion for October 1944.

Unit of the 8th Battalion, October 27th, 1944 outside Tilburg

By chance I came across a photograph of the 8th Royal Scots pausing during the attack on Tilburg, on October 27th.  Tilburg is roughly 66 km north of Nederweert.  

Today the journey south to where Private Arthur Chetham died takes just about 48 minutes by car and one and a half hours by train.

So far it is the closest I have got to him, but at least, a little of the story of a young man from Chorlton-cum-Hardy who was killed 77 years ago has come out of the shadows, and will help those in Nederweert, honour his memory.

Location; Nederweert

Pictures; Infantry and carriers of 8th Royal Scots pause during the attack on Tilburg in the Netherlands, October 27th, 1944, Sergeant Laing, No 5 Army Film & Photographic Unit, Imperial War Museum, Nederweert War Cemetery , 2020-2021, courtesy of The Adoption Graves Foundation of the Nederweert War Cemetery, and the collection of Jürgen Beekers

*Royal Scots, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Scots

** The Adoption Graves Foundation of the Nederweert War Cemetery https://adoptiongravesnederweert.com  

Looking for links between Chorlton and a wartime airman

Uden War Cemetery

Anyone who has got involved in family history will know both the excitement at making a new discovery about a relative and the frustrations when an individual just stubbornly refuses to come out of the shadows.

And it is no different when you are trying to uncover a complete stranger at the request of a fellow historian.  

It is something I have done before and always takes you on unexpected journeys.*

The enquiry came from a Dutch researcher looking for relatives in Chorlton of a young airman who had been killed in action and was buried in a local war cemetery.

I had his name, age and the names of his parents but all three remained elusive and even after revisiting the usual genealogical haunts all I could come up with was a reference to his birth in Prestwich.

Now the usual practice at this point is to go away and try again later often from a totally different angle.

And this was how the breakthrough came about because there in the Commonwealth graves site was the young man, including his service number and the day he died.  

He had been air gunner and died on June 23^rd 1943.

Now on that particular day the RAF had mounted an attack on a German rocket factory. The records provided details of the aircraft, the squadron and something of the outcome.  This was Operation Bellicose

Armed with this information it will be possible to track the operational records at the National Archive and identify the plane and the crew that our young RAF sergeant was part of.

But in a sense this was not the brief but once you start crawling over peoples’ lives you get drawn in.

And so the search revealed that his father had been born in Manchester in 1885, and that in 1911 aged 26 he was a ships steward, who was at home with his widowed mother in George Leigh Street off Great Ancoats Street.

A decade earlier the family had been running the Trafford Arms on the corner of Chadderton Street and Thompson Street.  It is an area I know well but the blitz and redevelopment have long since cleared most of what was once a densely packed area of shops houses, and factories on the edge of Oldham Road Goods Station.

George Leigh Stret, 1900

It is just a few minutes’ walk away from George Leigh Street and I guess with the death of his father his mother had moved to George Leigh Street where she opened a provisions shop which was enough of a going concern for her to employ a servant but didn’t warrant a mention of the directories of the period.

All of which is a little bit away from Sergeant Vincent Sugden who the story began with and the search for living relatives here in Chorlton.

Now Mr Sugden’s parents were married in 1914 and Vincent in 1921, but as yet there seems to be no connection with here.  His father may have died in 1945, followed by his wife a year, but equally there is a reference to someone who could have been his father dying eight years earlier in north Manchester.

There remains at present one possible line of enquiry and that involves a relative who posted details of the Sugden’s on one of the genealogical platforms.  It is a long shot because she has not been active on the site for a year, but I travel in hope.

And even if there are no links between Mr Sugden and Chorlton, well at least a little bit of his story had come back out of the shadows.

It may even be that my Dutch colleague is keen to follow my friend Rudd who set me off investigating another young airman who also died in action over Holland.  He was Sergeant George Blatherwick and like Vincent died when his plane was shot down a year earlier in the summer of 1942.

Rudd has been campaigning for a civic memorial to all those on both sides who died around the tiny Dutch village of Geffen.

* http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/George%20Blatherwick

Aircrew of 467 Squadron RAAF, August 1944

**Operation Bellicose targeted the Nazi Germany Zeppelin Works in Friedrichshafen and the La Spezia, Inaval base in Italy and was the first use of shuttle bombing in World War II.

Shuttle bombing involved bombers flying from their home base to bomb a first target and continue to a different location where they are refuelled and rearmed. 

The aircraft then bombed a second target on the return leg to their home base.

Operation Bellicose was the  first shuttle bombing mission. On the night of 20/21 June the RAF bombers departed from their bases in the United Kingdom and bombed Friedrichshafen, landing in Algeria where they refuelled and rearmed. 

On the return leg they bombed the Italian naval base at La Spezia

Pictures; Uden War Cemetery, where Sergeant Vincent Sugden is buried, Commonwealth Graves Commission, http://www.cwgc.org/find-a-cemetery/cemetery/2082100/UDEN%20WAR%  aircrew and ground staff from No. 467 Squadron RAAF with one of the Squadron's Lancaster bombers at RAF Station Waddington after the squadron had returned from a daylight attack on enemy airfields in Holland, August 14^th, 1944, a year after the squadron attacked Zeppelin Works in Friedrichshafen and the La Spezia, Italy, naval base, Wikipedia Commons and George Leigh Street, 1900, H Entwhistle, m11229, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council

More from Geffen in the Netherlands

Just when some question the value and relevance of closer European ties a correspondence from a Dutch friend reinforces my belief that we are stronger as a continent if we work closer together.

I first began corresponding with Ruud about a year ago and have mentioned his work researching the young men who died fighting around his home town of Geffen close to the Rhine.

 We worked on the story of Sgt Blatherwick who was killed when his aircraft was shot down in the July of 1942 and went on to collaborate in tracking the details of British soldiers who died as the allies pushed toward to the Rhine crossings in the closing stages of the war. 

Ruud has also tracked some of the German servicemen who died in the area. Upper most in his mind has been the wish to commemorate all who sacrificed their lives including the civilians of the town and to pass on details to surviving family members which he has been able to do.

I was so pleased that his efforts will now be rewarded by a permanent memorial in Geffen to all who died and a reminder of the conflicts which tore Europe apart in the 20th century.

My generation was born just after the war when the physical evidence of the conflict was everywhere, and I grew up against a backdrop of films and comics which focused on the struggle with Germany and Italy. And yet today I find it inconceivable that such wars were fought.

 All the more reason that we should work together not only to solve the problems of the present and the future but also try to uncover and share the fate of some who perished.

Picture; war grave in Geffen from the collection of Ruud Verhagen

Lost Lives Part Two

Sgt George Blatherwick died when his Stirling aircraft was shot down on a night raid in July 1942.

 My Dutch friend and I had been researching this young man. Ruud had done most of the work but I was able to track his early life and with the help of Oliver Bailey came up with the operational records of the squadron including a list of the aircrew who were killed over Geffen.

Picture; Record from the National Archive

Lost lives Part One

For me one of the great advantages of the internet is not only the ease with which you can communicate with people but the opportunities it has opened up to trawl historical records which previously would be very difficult to access.

I have over the last year asked the advice of an expert in English rural history who works at the University of Auckland, discussed Manchester Chartists with a professor in Leeds and discussed the finer points of an Arnot stove with a chap from Kent.

At the same time I have trawled the sources of the Library and Archive Canada and downloaded out of print 19th books as well of course as visiting census returns, parish records, the Quarter sessions and tithe lists.

So I was pleased to respond to a request to help a fellow historian in the Netherlands track the life of Sgt Blatherwick and his family and so honour a young man who died on a bombing raid in July 1942.
Ruud Verhagen has been researching the British, and German servicemen who died in and near his village during the Second World War.

George Blatherwick was just 20 and a wireless operator and front gunner. His aircraft was intercepted by a German night fighter and shot down over Geffen. Along with the rest of the crew he was buried in the garden of the local parish priest and later reinterred in the Uden War Cemetery.

Ruud’s starting point was the brief biographical details that he was the son of George and Ellen Blatherwick of Clayton in Manchester, and that they had been married in Chorlton in 1918 and were both buried in Southern Cemetery.

A search of the parish marriage records drew a blank but then of course I reasoned he might be a Roman Catholic or Non Conformist. The census returns for 1911 were more revealing and there I found two George Blatherwicks’ one of whom lived here. However it was the other George who proved more promising. He was aged just 16 in 1911 and lived in east Manchester. Tracking earlier census returns it was clear the family had lived in the same area since the 1860s.

This George would have been called up for the Great War and sure enough his military records had survived. He served from 1915 till 1919 and amongst the documents was a reference to his marriage to Ellen Young in December 1918. They were married in a church which was close to his family home and which is still standing, although about to undergo conversion into flats.

Now Clayton is not far from the church and where the family had lived and a search of old telephone directories brought up an address in Clayton just off the Ashton New Road. Close by is the old Board School opened in 1900 and still in use today and it is more than possible that Sgt Blatherwick may well have attended here in the 1930s.

To be continued

Pictures; Sgt George Blatherwick, and his gravestone, from the collection of Rudd Verhagen