The Man Behind the Medals In this blog series, SOFO Museum’s Research volunteers look at the stories behind some of the medal sets in the museum’s collection, from those that can be seen on a visit in our dedicated Medals display to some of those that are still tucked away in the archive. While medals will tell you a little bit about a soldier’s service, it’s only with further research that their…
The Lowestoft Journal published an article on 29th March 2022 covering the story of a unique photographic collection with historical connections to a tragic drowning of a number of Sea Scouts that had “come home” to a local Air Scout troop that had won bidding when the photos went to auction. The tragic events of June 1, 1914 saw three Sea Scouts, their two Scout Masters and a naval instructor drown when…
Featured: The Great War POW Album and Pilot’s Log Book of Lt. Frederick Matthews Recently donated to the museum was an incredible collection of items relating to Frederick Matthews, often referred to as ‘Eric’, who served with the Queens Own Oxfordshire Hussars and later the Royal Flying Corps. Eric’s story is already featured in our Airpower display in the museum’s permanent exhibition space, alongside copies of images now part of…
Osmond Bartle Wordsworth – An Unknown Officer killed during the Great War has now been identified as collateral descendant of poet William Wordsworth In late October, volunteers at the Soldiers of Oxfordshire Museum in Woodstock received good news after years of research that took them on a journey from a garden in Northern France to across the United Kingdom, Australia, The United States of America, Ireland, Canada -and back to…
Refugee Week 14-20 June 2021 ‘Gunner Gerin: Refugee and Liberator’ How did a Jewish Polish refugee come to be one of the liberators of Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in April 1945? A brief mention in a soldier’s war-time diary led Harry Staff, a volunteer researcher with the Soldiers of Oxfordshire Museum, to track down a remarkable story. Gunner Henry Gerin was formerly Henryk Bochynski. Born 1905 in Poland he arrived in…
Operation Dynamo – 80 years ago in May Shortly after the first Blitzkreig strike on 10 May 1940, the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) was in disorganised withdrawal before the tide of German Panzers, and Operation Dynamo jolted into action. A 60 mile escape corridor was organised to buy time for the BEF to evacuate from Dunkirk. The 1st Buckinghamshire Battalion and the 4th Battalion, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, the…
C Troop of 249 Battery returned to Mierloo on 8 March. On the 13th the Battery (minus A Troop who had moved the previous day tasked with providing protection for the Royal Artillery 8 Corps Headquarters) left for the German town of Issum. There is little reported in the War Diary between the 9th and the 20th apart from details of moves made by the various batteries of the 63rd…
January 1945 In October 1944, 249 Battery, 63 Anti-Tank Regiment (Oxfordshire Yeomanry), Royal Artillery arrived in France and moved forward into Belgium. The battery’s duties consisted mainly of guarding the flank of advancing troops as they moved into the Noord Brabant region of the Netherlands. In January 1945 249 Battery established their headquarters in the Dutch village of Heusden. As the first Allied soldiers the villagers had seen they were made…
The effects of the winter thaw of 1945 were varied for the men of the Oxfordshire Yeomanry. The roads of Noord Brabant suffered considerable damage and according to the War Diary of 7 February…”All available men from the Regiment were sent on road repairing….road to be repaired was the Deurne to Venray Road.” 10 February ‘C’ Troop of 249 Battery were moved to the Boxmeer area to protect a bridge across…
The War Memorial from the Oxford Co-operative and Industrial Society Ltd
