Tracing Civilian Dead

[Larry]

Guys,

Sometimes when Allied aircraft crashed in the UK, civilians were killed or later died of injuries but what is the best way of tracing such casualties and also those who have say died post war of thei injuries.

Sometimes the death toll in accounts of crashes may have been exaggerated over time.

Is there an online way of searching deaths in a particular area between certain dates?

[Observer1940]

Hello Larry


I expect you will know already, the type of information available, or missng in County Record Offices. I would be interested to know if anything online does exist too. However some Record Offices don't even have their collections fully catalogued and are years behind in indexing their collections?


I researched an air crash once onto a house involving civilians killed. The crash was mentioned very briefly in a local 1970s book, although the author had got the date two days out and the wrong crew names. However the author had the correct road name and the RAF Unit of the aircraft, so I did have something to go at at County and PRO level.

There was nothing online in my case, so I had to resort to records at the County Record Office.


The only clue on the Flying Accident Card was "2 Non RAF" with a crashed onto house reference. The Balloon Squadron ORB also stated aircraft crashed onto house and two occupants believed killed, but no civilian names and no road name.


What was interesting, was that although the Unit who held the aircraft on charge named the RAF crew and the civilian on board, no mention was made of the crash onto the house and the two civilans killed on the ground.


The crew and civilian on board the aircraft were registered "Due to War Operations" by the Unit, with a mileage reference to nearest town.

However, the two civilians on the ground were registered by their families "Due to War Operations" with an address where they died.

Unless someone has researched the incident and put the account online, I have found little online, only the quarterly General Register Office Indexes, but as you will know, you need to know the name/s first.


I used the following records: -
1. Emergency Planning Register or Chart
2. Some County Record Office have kept the forms of civilian deaths due to war operations / enemy action
3. ARP / War Committee records / Observer Corps


I discovered that there were no Police or Fire records. The Ambulance Log had no reference.


Unless the above record types are online, I fear there is little chance of finding anything online.


Once you have a name or names, you may find Death Notices placed by the family (but in the case I was researching the funeral report only referred to the Tragedy last week, but did say that the daughter survived because she was having tea with her family nearby).


You might be lucky that something got past the Censor and published in the newspaper. Then you might be even more fortunate to discover that the newspaper has been scanned by the British Library or on the Gale Databases.


One newspaper account, regarding another 1940 crash I am researching quotes the family living opposite and that nobody could have survived. I have traced the daughter who has a vivid recollection of the crash and one crew got off the aircraft and I noted his death has been treated differently in The Times RAF Casualty List. The newspaper just says 'Bomber Crash", although she and others traced confirmed it was definitely an RAF aircraft.


To get accurate information, I feel that a visit to the County Record Office might be the only way, but County Record Offices vary from nil information, to quite an amount amongst a number of differing types of records.


Some County Record Offices are placing limited information online, as part of their catalogue descriptions. But some CROs are poor and some War records remain virtually uncatalogued at County level, although some of their files being listed on A2A.


Mark

[Laurent Rizzotti]

For civilian war dead in UK, you can search them in the CWGC website by using the "Search Cemetery" function and then typing the name of the area (for exemple Chelsea): this will return you some cemeteries, but also the administrative name of the area (in this case Chelsea, Metropoliton Borough) and if you click on this you will have the full list of the civilian killed during the war, with (for most of them) the adress where they died (and for those who died of wounds, often the day when they were wounded and the place where they were).

What I am not sure is that if people killed by a falling RAF aircraft will be included in these lists. They should be if they were considered to be war victims.

[dp_burke]

here is an example thread from RAFC wehre teh civilians killed are lsited on CWGC.

The registration district in lieu of cemetery aids finding them.
http://www.rafcommands.com/forum/sho...ufighter-crash

[Observer1940]

Originally Posted by Laurent Rizzotti

For civilian war dead in UK, you can search them in the CWGC website by using the "Search Cemetery" function and then typing the name of the area (for exemple Chelsea): this will return you some cemeteries, but also the administrative name of the area (in this case Chelsea, Metropoliton Borough) and if you click on this you will have the full list of the civilian killed during the war, with (for most of them) the adress where they died (and for those who died of wounds, often the day when they were wounded and the place where they were).

What I am not sure is that if people killed by a falling RAF aircraft will be included in these lists. They should be if they were considered to be war victims.

Laurent
I agree, they should definitely be on CWGC online, or in the War Grave Volumes, available at most provincial main libraries if they were killed by a crashing RAF aircraft and died due to War Operations. In the case I was researching they were just listed as Civilian War Dead in the Borough, with address, the date and that they died due to enemy action (which is false!!) as the Borough's Civilian War Dead.

However, I am not sure if civilians would be, if the crash was officially deemed 'FA' or a "Flying Accident', as they may not always be 'War Dead'?

Regarding the civilian on the RAF aircraft, the CWGC description was incorrect and having an aerodrome some distance away as his place of death and despite sending copy RAF Daily Routine Orders burial reference, plus their ORB (of the Station organising the funeral) and RAF Unit ORB documentation (who held the aircraft on charge), Flying Accident Card copy, along with a Civil Death Certificate copy indicating place of death (exactly the same as the Accident Card 1/2 Mile North of ...) and also reported to the Deaths Registrar by the RAF Unit who held the RAF aircraft on charge, although CWGC: -

i) acknowledged my correspondence, they failed to reply and only
ii) altered the description, to suggest that he was just one of the Borough's War Dead.
Which is still not strictly correct as he was crew on the RAF aircraft, despite sending CWGC all the information.

His grave with six of the RAF crew buried from the same crash in the War Graves plot, is marked by a family memorial, which gives his name, the date of death and also states in a Flying Accident.

One question, can you search CWGC by date alone for the whole of the UK?

Or is it a question of searching by Borough and then looking down the Borough list, for dates of each individual?

Mark

[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.

[Alan Clark]

Civilians on board RAF aircraft were not always included on the CWGC database, probably because they had never been put onto the borough / district list which the CWGC derived their data from. I have a few cases of civilian employees of manufacturers doing contracted work for the RAF who were not on the database, but I also have a similar number of people who are on the database. Those who are usually worked for Air Work (a company within the Hawker Siddeley group).

Civilian test crews (test pilots, flight engineers and FTOs) who died in flying accidents directly connected with test flying for the parent company tend not to be included.

[Observer1940]

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.

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