A short event was held at 8.45pm on Saturday July 2nd in the centre of the cemetery to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Battle of the Somme.
A circle was made of the giant poppies first used in our 2014 events together with T lights which were given to all who attended. Led by Robin Mansfield members of the FOMRC History group read aloud the names of those buried or commemorated in the cemetery who died as a result of the Battles of the Somme. There followed a reading of the names of the other WW1 dead remembered in the cemetery. The Rev Margaret Widdess led prayers and the Commemoration and the Last Post was played by local resident Benedict Ni Mhaonaigh.
Just one of the 34 men who died at the Somme:
Drummer Benjamin Robert Thompson, of the 11th Battalion the Suffolk Regiment, was wounded by a shell at La Boiselle, at the Somme, on 2 July 1916 while working as a stretcher-bearer rescuing the injured from “No Man’s Land”. He subsequently had one leg amputated. He was brought back to England, where he died in the military hospital at Whalley, Lancashire, on 4 August of the same year. He was awarded the Military Medal, which was a Level-3 Gallantry Award. (See Graves/War Graves/WW1 graves for more stories of local men.)