Budleigh Past and Present

Continued from  1 November 1944 LIEUTENANT HARRY ROYSTON BARTLETT (1924-44)   41 Commando, Royal Marines https://budleighpastandpresent.blogspot.com/2020/09/ww2-757-brave-royal-marine-wounded-at.html     The badge of 518 Squadron.   Its motto in Gaelic was ‘Tha An Iuchair Againn-Ne’, translated as ‘We hold the key’   Image credit: www.valka.cz   Rennie’s name does not appear on Budleigh Salterton’s War Memorial. However his Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) record tells us not only that he was a member of 518 Squadron, giving his Service Number as 1381426, but that his wife Mary Grace was from the town. Quite apart from that link with Budleigh, Rennie’s story reveals a fascinating and little known aspect of the Royal Air Force’s operations that he and his fellow-airmen in 518 Squadron carried out on an almost daily basis during WW2. In fact the Squadron’s activities were so little known that at least one wartime history researcher has publicly expressed his frustra

Continued from 5 October 1944. PRIVATE LEONARD THOMAS LEY (1913-44) 1st Battalion, the King's Own Royal Regiment (the Lancaster Regiment). https://budleighpastandpresent.blogspot.com/2021/04/ww2-75-5-october-1944-grave-on-adriatic.html         Budleigh Salterton War Memorial at the junction of Coastguard Road and Salting Hill My research into Albert Watkins’ wartime service raised many questions. For some time I saw him as one of the War Memorial’s ‘orphans’: his name was listed simply as A.G. Watkins, and gave no helpful clues as where he might have died. Others had found the same problem: the Devon Heritage website gave his death as ‘Not yet confirmed’.   A few helpful details suddenly emerged when Budleigh resident Kevin Curran kindly sent me the copy of a news item published in the Exmouth Journal , dated 11 November 1944. The item reported ‘the death on active service of Pte. Albert Watkins, The Devonshire Regiment, whose death took place in India, previous t

Continued from 31 Aug 1944 GUNNER HERBERT JAMES SKINNER (1914-44)            113 th   Field Regiment, the Royal Artillery https://budleighpastandpresent.blogspot.com/2021/04/ww2-75-31-august-1944-death-of-black.html       Budleigh war memorial at the junction of Coastguard Road and Salting Hill Leonard was a local man whose name appears on Budleigh Salterton’s War Memorial and the news of his death would have been greeted with much sorrow in the town.   Describing the service and parade held by the local branch of the British Legion on Saturday 11 November 1944, the Exmouth Journal noted that Leonard had been a Legion member for many years, and that the Legion Chairman, Colonel Henry McRae DSO, OBE had referred to the sad news.   The grave of Ellen and Thomas Ley in Block E, Row 10 at St Peter’s Burial Ground, Moor Lane An earlier sadness for the family before the outbreak of war had been the death of Leonard’s mother Ellen, née Powlesland, on 31 January 1937, ag