大象传媒

"LEST WE FORGET"

It was early November in the year 2000 when I stood as I had done for countless Novembers selling poppies on the street in South Wigston for Remembrance Day on the 11th. People put money in to the tin as they passed, gave a cheery greeting or stopped for a few minutes for a chat. I am always heartened by the numbers of children who show interest and want to buy a poppy.
Then almost without me noticing her approach she was there at my side. A tiny little figure whom I guessed to be around five feet tall but with a huge heart as she generously piled the coins into my tin.
"You see", she said, "My husband was killed in the war and I never forget him."
The lady was ninety years old. She had lived a full life eventually remarrying and brought up four sons, but those words stuck in my mind, "I never forget him."
The lady carried on to tell me how her husband had died in the Royal Navy and how they had spent his last leave at home. The presents he had bought for her and their three sons and I felt the lump rising in my throat.
I had been selling poppies since the age of sixteen years and knew exactly why I was selling them but the only knowledge I had of the victims of war in South Wigston were the stories that I had heard from my Mother of the lads that used to live in the village and never came back. I had never before met anyone first hand to tell me of their personal loss.
I realized that whilst I had been selling poppies for years. I knew absolutely nothing about the men listed on the South Wigston or Wigston Magna war memorials. The lady's words pounded inside my head. I felt I had to know about the village men who had died for freedom. I was standing where they had stood, I was walking where they had walked, I had to get to know who they were.
My quest began immediately and through the following pages I have come to know them. Come to shed tears for them as each story has unfolded before me, shed tears for the families they left behind, the father1ess children who still cry for the love of a father they were so cruelly deprived of and to know that without their courage and sacrifice life as we know it would never have been. I look at their photographs and for a few moments they are alive again.
Sadly it has not been possible to find descendants of every man who gave his life but all of the men listed on the war memorials in Wigston are listed here even If their stories are yet to be told. There are many and I hope that in the future someone may follow on with them. Stories too of the differing groups of Wigston people who gave dedicated service which have only been lightly touched on here. The Land Army Girls, The ATS, ARP, Civil Defence and many other Wigston organizations.

During the course of my research I have discovered names that are not listed on the Saint Thomas War Memorial or All Saints War Memorial and this I hope may be put right in the future. To date I have been able to see two of the names included on to Saint Thomas War Memorial and fifteen names on to a new Memorial Plaque at the Wigston Memorial Peace Park. This book is dedicated to the memory of all the men and to Doris Hills, the little lady, who without knowing it set me on their trail. It is also dedicated to my Mother whose marvellous memory has helped enormously and to my sister Valerie who tirelessly has driven me miles to collect material and to all the relatives and friends of the war heroes who so generously and trustingly have allowed me to use their treasured photographs. Without their tremendous support this book would never have been written.
It is my hope that, when these pages are turned, the men of Wigston will come alive again, we will know them and remember their dedication and legacy of freedom they have bequeathed us.
"LEST WE FORGET."
Pamela Ward May 2003

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