Hi Pete
Good to hear you have made some progress!
Sandport Street, as far as I'm aware, was in NORTH LEITH.
Best wishes
Lesley
Multiple Edinburgh deaths on the same day - 2nd April 1916
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AndrewP
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Hi Pete,Pete_Wood wrote:It now occurs to me that you experts may be able to help me pinpoint other districts which were affected by the German bombs:
16 Marshall Street (districts identified thanks) 5 men and 1 child killed
Commercial Street (near Sandport Street) 1 man killed
Bonnington Road (identified thanks) I infant killed - see above
Graham Street (near Lauriston Place) 1 man subsequently died of injuries
69 St Leonard's Hill (identified) 1 infant, aged 5 years, killed - see above
Grassmarket (St George district?) by White Hart Hotel; 1 man later died of injuries
In the Lothian and Borders Fire and Rescue Service Museum in Lauriston Place, Edinburgh, there are registers of incidents attended over the years. It may be worth contacting them to see if they can give you some of the information you are seeking.
e-mail: enquiries@lbfire.org.uk
web: http://www.lothian.fire-uk.org/about_us ... ontact.htm
The HQ and museum are in adjoining buildings, so hopefully an e-mail to the address above can be forwarded in the right direction. These buildings are only a stone's throw from Graham Street that you mention.
All the best,
Andrew Paterson
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Pete_Wood
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- Joined: Mon Nov 28, 2005 7:00 am
This is fabulous info/advice!! I will follow up all leads and suggestions.
Andrew I was aware, from an article in The Scotsman (Lesley where would I be without you) that there was a fierce rivalry between the Edinburgh brigade and the Leith firefighters (who turned away all offers of help when the Zeppelins bombed Leith). I do hope their records survive. I managed to unearth the surviving records of the Greater London brigade - and they proved invaluable in pin-pointing where the bombs fell.
I've finally managed to get to the St Giles deaths. If anyone else is interested in following this, you may care to look at William Smith Ewing, aged 23, killed in Marshall Street.....
Best wishes to my 'TalkingScot' friends
Pete
Andrew I was aware, from an article in The Scotsman (Lesley where would I be without you) that there was a fierce rivalry between the Edinburgh brigade and the Leith firefighters (who turned away all offers of help when the Zeppelins bombed Leith). I do hope their records survive. I managed to unearth the surviving records of the Greater London brigade - and they proved invaluable in pin-pointing where the bombs fell.
I've finally managed to get to the St Giles deaths. If anyone else is interested in following this, you may care to look at William Smith Ewing, aged 23, killed in Marshall Street.....
Best wishes to my 'TalkingScot' friends
Pete
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Pete_Wood
- Posts: 7
- Joined: Mon Nov 28, 2005 7:00 am
Thanks to the amazing assistance I have received so far, I have been able to trace all but one of the casualties of the Zeppelin raids on Scotland - and I haven't given up hope of finding the 'lost victim' as I still have other channels of research to follow.
As well as finding the 'official' casualties, listed at the locations above, I have also uncovered a few 'unknown' victims - those who died of a heart attack which, in the examining doctor's opinion, was brought on as a direct consequence of the bombing. In one case, the woman lived at a tenement where a bomb landed and the official records had noted that two people were injured (I have come to realise that this is an all-emcompassing term which means aid was given, or that the person was hospitalised mainly due to shock).
The official records also stated that two men subsequently died of their injuries; one at Marshall Street, and the other from injuries sustained outside the White Hart Hotel (the latter is still unidentified as of yet).
I did have one clue, however. The Scotsman newspaper reporter mentioned, after the war (and as David pointed out), that one man was a soldier who "succumbed to his wounds a few days after the raid. He was a Private in the Royal Scots."
Fortunately, I have quite a bit of experience with military matters - especially in the Great War - so it didn't take me long to find him. But I thought others may care to know how I did it, in case you need to solve a similar 'case.'
After the two world wars, all those who died (or were killed) while serving in the armed services, were recorded on the Commonwealth War Graves Register (there is a website at www.cwgc.org). Here you can put in a soldier's name, and it will tell you when he/she died, and where they are buried - or on which memorial they are remembered.
That's fine if you know their name. But I didn't......
However, all is not lost. There are a couple of other methods.
If you look on the CWGC website, in the search box where it says 'Casualty', this is a drop-down box. Not many people are aware that if you click on this, it reveals the word 'Cemetery.' Now you can enter a town or name of a cemetery (if you know it).
So, if you enter Edinburgh, you will find that there are 23 cemeteries where servicemen are buried (or commemorated). If you click on these, all the names of those who are located in the cemetery come up in alphabetical order.
Alright, so I have narrowed down my search, a little, but I was confident I could pinpoint 'my' soldier.
After WW1, a massive project was undertaken to privately record all the army casualties of the 1914-1918 conflict.. The publication, in 20 odd volumes, was called 'Soldiers Died In The Great War.' These books allow you to find out the name of about 99% of all those killed, when they died, and where they are commemorated. But even better is the fact that a company recently digitised the information and put it onto a CD-Rom; still called Soldiers Died In The Great War (aka SDGW disc).
You will find this CD-Rom at most large libraries (usually in the reference section). The great thing about this CD-Rom is that it allows you to put in specific dates, and regiments, without having to put in a name of a soldier - so, for example, you can find out all the names of the soldiers who were killed on the first day of The Battle of The Somme (1.7.1916).
This CD-Rom also gives additional info, such as place of birth, town of residence, and place of enlistment.
So all I did was to enter Royal Scots Regiment and put in the month of February 1916. I also selected the criteria 'Died at Home' (in the UK, rather than France & Flanders, or Middle East etc).
The results showed just three soldiers fitted the criteria, and one of them was buried in Edinburgh.
I entered the name of the Edinburgh man first, into SP, and got my instand result. Pte Thomas Donaghue - normal residence is stated as 27 Marshall Strret - who died on the 10th of February (8 days after the raid) in The Royal Infirmary, of "injuries to intestine by piece of shell (8 days), peritonitis (4 days) and heart failure (1 day)."
Now I put his name into the CWGC register and can see where he is buried:
Name: DONOGHUE
Initials: T
Nationality: United Kingdom
Rank: Private
Regiment: Royal Scots
Unit Text: 3rd/4th Bn.
Date of Death: 11/04/1916
Service No: 1876
Casualty Type: Commonwealth War Dead
Grave/Memorial Reference: Screen Wall. A1. 25A.
Cemetery: EDINBURGH (NEWINGTON, OR ECHO BANK) CEMETERY
His official date of death is given, by the death certificate, as the 10th February, whereas the CWGC gives the 11th Feb. This is not unusual.
What Donaghue's record has shown me, and that I hadn't appreciated, is that his death is registered in the St Giles District - because he died in the Royal Infirmary.
II have now realised that my 'missing' casualty, also probably died at the hospital local to 'The White Hart'. I don't know if this was also The Royal Infirmary, as yet, but once I have exhausted the Fire Brigade records, I may just have to trawl through all the registers around the date of the bomb in districts which have a hospital nearby.
Anyway, I just wanted to show that finding a 'needle in a haystack' is not improssible.
As well as finding the 'official' casualties, listed at the locations above, I have also uncovered a few 'unknown' victims - those who died of a heart attack which, in the examining doctor's opinion, was brought on as a direct consequence of the bombing. In one case, the woman lived at a tenement where a bomb landed and the official records had noted that two people were injured (I have come to realise that this is an all-emcompassing term which means aid was given, or that the person was hospitalised mainly due to shock).
The official records also stated that two men subsequently died of their injuries; one at Marshall Street, and the other from injuries sustained outside the White Hart Hotel (the latter is still unidentified as of yet).
I did have one clue, however. The Scotsman newspaper reporter mentioned, after the war (and as David pointed out), that one man was a soldier who "succumbed to his wounds a few days after the raid. He was a Private in the Royal Scots."
Fortunately, I have quite a bit of experience with military matters - especially in the Great War - so it didn't take me long to find him. But I thought others may care to know how I did it, in case you need to solve a similar 'case.'
After the two world wars, all those who died (or were killed) while serving in the armed services, were recorded on the Commonwealth War Graves Register (there is a website at www.cwgc.org). Here you can put in a soldier's name, and it will tell you when he/she died, and where they are buried - or on which memorial they are remembered.
That's fine if you know their name. But I didn't......
However, all is not lost. There are a couple of other methods.
If you look on the CWGC website, in the search box where it says 'Casualty', this is a drop-down box. Not many people are aware that if you click on this, it reveals the word 'Cemetery.' Now you can enter a town or name of a cemetery (if you know it).
So, if you enter Edinburgh, you will find that there are 23 cemeteries where servicemen are buried (or commemorated). If you click on these, all the names of those who are located in the cemetery come up in alphabetical order.
Alright, so I have narrowed down my search, a little, but I was confident I could pinpoint 'my' soldier.
After WW1, a massive project was undertaken to privately record all the army casualties of the 1914-1918 conflict.. The publication, in 20 odd volumes, was called 'Soldiers Died In The Great War.' These books allow you to find out the name of about 99% of all those killed, when they died, and where they are commemorated. But even better is the fact that a company recently digitised the information and put it onto a CD-Rom; still called Soldiers Died In The Great War (aka SDGW disc).
You will find this CD-Rom at most large libraries (usually in the reference section). The great thing about this CD-Rom is that it allows you to put in specific dates, and regiments, without having to put in a name of a soldier - so, for example, you can find out all the names of the soldiers who were killed on the first day of The Battle of The Somme (1.7.1916).
This CD-Rom also gives additional info, such as place of birth, town of residence, and place of enlistment.
So all I did was to enter Royal Scots Regiment and put in the month of February 1916. I also selected the criteria 'Died at Home' (in the UK, rather than France & Flanders, or Middle East etc).
The results showed just three soldiers fitted the criteria, and one of them was buried in Edinburgh.
I entered the name of the Edinburgh man first, into SP, and got my instand result. Pte Thomas Donaghue - normal residence is stated as 27 Marshall Strret - who died on the 10th of February (8 days after the raid) in The Royal Infirmary, of "injuries to intestine by piece of shell (8 days), peritonitis (4 days) and heart failure (1 day)."
Now I put his name into the CWGC register and can see where he is buried:
Name: DONOGHUE
Initials: T
Nationality: United Kingdom
Rank: Private
Regiment: Royal Scots
Unit Text: 3rd/4th Bn.
Date of Death: 11/04/1916
Service No: 1876
Casualty Type: Commonwealth War Dead
Grave/Memorial Reference: Screen Wall. A1. 25A.
Cemetery: EDINBURGH (NEWINGTON, OR ECHO BANK) CEMETERY
His official date of death is given, by the death certificate, as the 10th February, whereas the CWGC gives the 11th Feb. This is not unusual.
What Donaghue's record has shown me, and that I hadn't appreciated, is that his death is registered in the St Giles District - because he died in the Royal Infirmary.
II have now realised that my 'missing' casualty, also probably died at the hospital local to 'The White Hart'. I don't know if this was also The Royal Infirmary, as yet, but once I have exhausted the Fire Brigade records, I may just have to trawl through all the registers around the date of the bomb in districts which have a hospital nearby.
Anyway, I just wanted to show that finding a 'needle in a haystack' is not improssible.
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AndrewP
- Site Admin
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- Location: Edinburgh
Well done.Pete_Wood wrote:Anyway, I just wanted to show that finding a 'needle in a haystack' is not impossible.
The Royal Infirmary would certainly have been the nearest hospital to the White Hart (one of my drinking dens in my student days).Pete_Wood wrote:I have now realised that my 'missing' casualty, also probably died at the hospital local to 'The White Hart'. I don't know if this was also The Royal Infirmary, as yet, but once I have exhausted the Fire Brigade records, I may just have to trawl through all the registers around the date of the bomb in districts which have a hospital nearby.
Another angle to consider, would he have been classed as war wounded and possibly ended out in Craiglockhart War Hospital, in Colinton Parish?
http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ltg/projects/j ... glock.html
All the best,
Andrew Paterson
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Pete_Wood
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Hi Andrew, anything is possible.AndrewP wrote: Another angle to consider, would he have been classed as war wounded and possibly ended out in Craiglockhart War Hospital, in Colinton Parish?
However I thought that Craiglockhart was only for officers, suffering with 'nervous' disorders.
If I can't track down my man, via the St Giles registers, I will certainly give your suggestion a go.
Many thanks indeed
Pete