Five soldiers who lost their lives during the First World War are soon to have their names added to a village war memorial after almost a century of waiting, with a history researcher insisting they “must never be forgotten”.

Chepping Parish Council have agreed to have the names of the five men added to the Flackwell Heath war memorial, in Common Road, after a village history group discovered they had been missed off when the commemorative stone was first created.

The people all had strong connections to the village and will soon be commemorated when an engraver adds their names to the current list of 50 men.

BFP nostalgia expert, and chairman of the Flackwell Heath and Loudwater Local History Group, Mike Dewey, said: “Those who made the ultimate sacrifice must not be forgotten.

“At the time when the plans for the memorials were being made after WWI, nearly a hundred years ago, there were no qualifying criteria laid down as to who should be on a memorial.

“It was almost inevitable that some men and women would be overlooked. Remember that 100 years ago formal means of communication were much more limited than they are now.

“For example, the wives of men who had been killed might well have moved away, to stay with other members of their families perhaps, and so their names could easily have been forgotten in the village.”

The discovery of the missing names was first made by group member Ruth Bowler while she was carrying out research on the people already mentioned on the memorial.

The parish council have not yet been able to confirm when the names will be added to the war memorial.

Bucks Free Press:

The forgotten five (compiled by Ruth Bowler of the Flackwell Heath and Loudwater Local History Group):

  • Ernest Barton, a Private in the Oxon & Bucks Light Infantry. He was born in the village in 1886, and married in 1914 a woman also born in the village. He enlisted at High Wycombe later in 1914, and was killed in France on May 16th 1915 aged 29.
  • Edgar Lewis, a Private in the Oxon & Bucks Light Infantry. He married at High Wycombe in 1912, had three children, and at the time of his death (in France on July 19, 1916) his widow was living at Folley’s Row, Flackwell Heath.
  • Leonard Savill, a Lance Corporal in the 7th Battalion of the London Regiment, was killed in France on April 5th, 1918, aged just 20. His parents address at the time of his death was ‘’The Haven’’, Flackwell Heath.
  • Frank Stone-Wootten, a Company Quarter Master and Second Lieutenant in King’s Royal Rifle Corps, was killed in Belgium on September 21, 1917, aged 26. At that time his parents were living at ‘’The Hammock’’, Flackwell Heath.
  • George Weedon, a Lance Corporal in the Military Foot Police. He was born in Flackwell Heath in 1877 and married a local girl in 1905. He did not die until Dec 19th 1920 and is buried in the churchyard of St Mary’s in Farnham Royal.