01993 810 210

Year: 2024

In this guest blog from Abingdon historian Steve King, he tells the story of four of the town’s D-Day heroes – at least one of whom will be instantly familiar to regular visitors and readers of the blog!   Abingdon’s D-Day Four Steve King   3 June 1944 (D -2) The greatest invasion force the world had ever seen has assembled along the south coast of England, from Cornwall to…

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The First Fatality of D-Day? While Lt. Den Brotheridge, taking part in the capture of Pegasus Bridge, is considered to be the first allied soldier killed in action, L/Cpl Fred Greenhalgh (3449663) was possibly the first fatal casualty of D-Day on 6th June 1944.  Who was he and how did it happen?   Fred was born in 1915 in Chorlton, Lancs, the son of Sam & Lily Greenhalgh. The Greenhalgh’s…

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Johnny Granville joined the 2nd Battalion of the Regiment as a Second Lieutenant in August 1936, when the Battalion was in India. He quickly made his mark as an instructor and as a polo player in the regimental team, as well as a fine shot. Posted home early in 1940 he was appointed Adjutant of 7th. Battalion of the Regiment as it was formed in Aldershot. As the Battalion expanded…

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To help us mark D-Day 80th we are enormously grateful to the Granville family for the donation of John Granville’s medals. LIEUTENANT COLONEL JOHN GRANVILLE OXFORDSHIRE AND BUCKINGHAMSHIRE LIGHT INFANTRY 1913 – 1984. Johnny Granville joined the 2nd Battalion of the Regiment as a Second Lieutenant in August 1936, when the Battalion was in India. He quickly made his mark as an instructor and as a polo player in the…

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Armed Forces Day Garden Party Saturday 22 June 2024 12pm – 8.30pm Join us to mark Armed Forces Day and celebrate 10 years of Soldiers of Oxfordshire Museum! On Saturday 22 June we’ll be holding a Garden Party in the beautiful gardens of The Oxfordshire Museum, just outside our front door! Our museum galleries, including our recently updated permanent galleries and our trio of brand new temporary exhibitions, Oxfordshire to…

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Our thanks to RAF Benson for providing this article and photographs. Women of the WAAF: Joan Woodruff (née Heraghty) Joan Heraghty was born on 4 November 1923 and originally came from Goldthorpe, a few miles away from Doncaster in South Yorkshire. At eighteen years of age she decided to join the Woman’s Auxiliary Air Force. After her days of learning to march and learning about the Royal Air Force (square…

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Women of the Air Transport Auxiliary – Freydis Mary Sharland Thanks to RAF Benson for providing us with this article Between 1939 and 1945, more than 1,300 ATA pilots delivered warplanes between factories, facilities and bases across Britain, and, later, into mainland Europe and the Mediterranean. In January 1940, the ATA’s first eight female pilots were recruited, and, based at what had been the De Havilland airfield at Hatfield in…

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Naomi & Arthur: Letters from Liberation A new permanent exhibition opens on 27th January 2024 at the Soldiers of Oxfordshire Museum, tells a story of how a small act of kindness can have a life-changing impact. It will focus on two people from different worlds – Arthur Tyler, a soldier with the Oxfordshire Yeomanry, and Naomi Kaplan, a Polish Jew who survived both Auschwitz-Birkenau and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps. When the…

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Soldiers of Oxfordshire Museum
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