The War Memorials of Barwick & Scholes
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The War Memorials of Barwick & Scholes
Barwicker No. 115
September 2014
My War Memorial website has been online for over eight years, but
my interest in the men named on the memorials in Barwick and
Scholes goes back much further.
I first became interested in the Great War as child, after being shown
the medals awarded to my maternal grandfather and his brother in that
war, and in the more than thirty-five years since that day, my interest
has grown and developed into a study, not only of the local men whose
names appear on the memorials, but an academic study of the war as a
whole, the role of the West Yorkshire Regiment, and specifically its
Territorial Force battalions during that time.
As my interest has deepened over the years, and my knowledge of the
war has increased, I have developed an enduring admiration for what
the people of the Great War era went through. Not only the fighting
men, but the auxiliary services, those engaged in war work, and those
left behind to keep house and home together under the burden of the
nagging anxiety that was ever present when a loved one was fighting
overseas. It has also shaped my opinions of those people, destroying
the myths which emerged in the period of 'Oh! What a lovely War '.
Any balanced and structured research into the war and its prosecution
destroys the idea that the British Army was an army of 'Lions led by
Donkeys', that its generals were buffoons, uncaring of the men they
were set to command, that it was a war that Britain should never have
got involved in, and that it was all in vain. Careful study of primary
source material shows that had Britain reneged on her treaty
obligations and stayed neutral, Europe would have perished under the
German Militaristic Empire-building Kaiser. It shows that those
officers who held the very highest ranks were professional and able
men, capable of beating the German Army in the field, which is,
ultimately, precisely what they did, and those who were shown
wanting were quickly removed from command.
Our local war memorials don't list any of the officer casualties who
held General's rank, though there were a few hundred. They list the
junior officers and rank and file soldiers - the tools with which the
generals fought the war.
Our villages were home to a very small number of regular pre-war
servicemen, the vast majority of them were men who joined the
colours as volunteers, Derby Scheme men, or as conscripts. They were
civilians in uniform, with lives, families and homes rooted in the
villages we occupy today. They could have been us. But they were
compelled to serve in a war of unprecedented scale and reach. They
left their homes, their lives and their families to help to bring victory
for the Allies, which secured our own freedom, and restored Lit of our
invaded neighbours. They may well have been individuals amongst
millions, but each and everyone was integral to achieving he final
victory. They deserve to be remembered.
My website is just one tool by which we can learn about these men,
what they left, what they encountered and endured. My primary
assertion on the website is that we cannot hope to adequately, or
genuinely remember these men unless we know something about them.
As soon as we learn something of them they become real and much
more than just a name in a list on a panel on a memorial.
They are our men.
We will remember them.
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