The Ypres Battlefield
I
had heard about it all back in my schooldays. But I have to say that my
history teacher years ago was as dull as ditchwater, and we spent most
of our time taking dictated notes! Surprisingly, I managed to get a pass
in history, but the field was arid to me, and I moved on to what I thought
were more important things.
However I had a lingering interest because Jill, my wife, had a grandfather who was injured in 1918 in the trenches at Ypres, and was taken to a hospital in France, where he died.
I then discovered that the War Graves Commission has a database on all casualties in wars last century. This Register provides personal and service details and places of commemoration for the 1.7 million members of the Commonwealth forces who died in the First or Second World Wars. A staggering figure of losses - and that was only on one side. There's a page for each person who died, and the record of Bombardier Charles James Ashman is to be found. He died of wounds on February 22nd, 1917.
We found his faded photograph at Jill's mother's home. Jill and her sister Margaret's father will never have known him. We understand that during a lull in fighting he had gone to give a cup of tea to a comrade, and a sniper had shot him.