 |
|
|
|
|
|
A Visit To St. James Cemetery In Dover, England
April 15, 2006
|
|
|
|
|
| |
xxxxxx |
Mary Eldridge, Roger Tyack, Glen Gaudet and George Egan spent an afternoon visiting several sites in the Deal and Dover area of Kent, England.
St James Cemetery lies on a rolling hillside beneath Dover Castle on the outskirts of Dover. Here one finds graves from branches of the services from World War I and World War II. Spread throughout are the final resting places of some eighteen Canadians.
Among the Canadian graves are two Nova Scotians; Harry Webster Smith of Halifax NS with the Canadian Infantry (Nova Scotia Regiment) - died 21/09/1916 aged 27; and
John Joseph Cann, of Sydney Mines, Cape Breton, NS with the Canadian Infantry (Central Ontario Regiment) 3rd Battalion - died 17/11/1915.
During the First World War, Dover was a port of departure for troops going to the Western Front. Between August 1914 and August 1919 some 1,300,000 Common-wealth sick and wounded were landed at Dover. The port was bombed in 1915 and again in August 1916. Dover (St James's) Cemetery contains 392 First World War burials (10 of them unidentified) in several plots in various parts of the burial ground. One of these plots contains the graves of seamen and Marines killed during the raid on Zeebruge in Belgium, an important German submarine base, in 1918.
In 1940, Dover was the headquarters for the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force from Dunkirk and nearly 200,000 of the 366,000 British and Allied troops brought back during the operation were landed there.
Throughout the war Dover was a particular target for the long range guns on the French coast.
Most of the 356 Second World War burials are contained in a special war graves plot at the far end of the cemetery. The plot, known as the Dunkirk plot, contains many graves from the Dunkirk operation. 22 of these burials are unidentified. There are also 8 Foreign National war burials and 2 non war service burials in the cemetery.
(Information can be found at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website)
Return to News Menu
|
| | |
|
|
|
|
|
