Quote:
Originally Posted by Laurent Rizzotti
Yes, you can now (since some weeks, before you had to us Geoff's search online) search the CWGC database and retrieve all civilian casualties (in the database) for one day. Go to Advanced Search for this.
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Thank you Laurent and Alan.
I am sure that I did this somehow about a decade ago and then CWGC changed their web site design and one could no longer search by day.
I made an initial attempt to go through The Times lists of 31st August 1940 and 21st September 1940 of the RAF Dead and the Missing whilst cross checking their names with the CWGC database, but discovered that CWGC had the date of one dying some months after The Times anouncement, so I gave up my laborious search and it remains incomplete.
Alan, it strikes me, that to rely on CWGC alone (without other research and secondary research), that their site may not reveal every single casualty.
I have found two references in an ORB 15.8.40 to the name of "Surridge" and "Sgt Surridge" at an English crash scene, but despite searching the GRO Index, the "name of Surridge on identity disc taken by police." must be one of those unexplained mysteries.
The two local County Archives covering that area now, claim that they don't seem to have Police records either.
Dennis, the "Free BMD" site is very good and you can actually see the GRO Index page too, free of charge, which has all the information required to order a Certificate from the GRO.
Yes Larry, despite newspapers being subject to Censorship, one should always check them too, I managed to trace the family mentioned and whilst the newspaper was not absolutely correct, I did glean a bit more information about what they were being "led to believe" at the time regarding the crash, which in turn answered another question.
Mark