Scouts Visit The Bayeux War Cemetery Memorial
Brockham Scouts Visit The Bayeux War Cemetery
Memorial, Normandy, France
Brockham Scouts visit the Bayeux War Cemetery Memorial to place
a wreath for Trooper Frederick George Pitt whose name is carved on
the War Memorial in Brockham Churchyard.
The 22nd Dorking (Brockham) Scout Troop was camping in Trois
Monts in Suisse Normandy in July 2010. This was their fourth visit
in thirtythree years to Trois Monts as the guest of Monsieur Le
Clerc at Le Vaugroult. This location enabled the Scouts to hold
their Sunday Service at the War Cemetery in Bayeux. Derick Holgate
of Brockham British Legion supplied the Scouts with details of the
fallen who are remembered by the Scouts and other Groups in
Brockham every Remembrance Sunday.
Frederick George Pitt died on Saturday 24th June 1944 aged 27.
He was a Trooper in the 43rd (2/5th Bn. Gloucestershire Regiment)
Reconnaissance Corps. The Bayeux Memorial commemorates over 1800
men of the land forces who died in fighting in Normandy and in the
advance to the River Seine and who have no known grave.
Three Patrol Leaders, Tim Hines, Christian Hamilton and George
Gomez placed a wreath from Brockham Scouts beside Panel 7 of the
Memorial.
This followed a short Service led by Scout Leaders Simon Long
and John Knight. Scout Tom Budd read a prayer and Tony Hines closed
the service with the very emotional closing, 'They shall not grow
old as we grow old and at the going down of the sun and in the
morning we will remember them'.
Group Scout Leader Simon Long commented on the poignancy of the
Service as an alternative to the more traditional Church Service
for the Scout Troop.
The War Memorial in Brockham Church Yard has recently been
refurbished with funds from within the community in Brockham,
including the Brockham Scouts. Thirteen Brockham residents gave
their lives in the 1939-1945 War. We do not know if Frederick was a
Scout in Brockham or if any of his family has ever had the
opportunity to visit his Memorial Stone. It has been an enormous
pleasure to help expand the research work the British Legion is
doing on all those remembered in Brockham Churchyard. After the
service at the memorial the Scouts visited the site of the D Day
landings at Arromanches on the Normandy coast. This visit had an
additional opportunity to note the passing of a second Brockham
resident who gave his life in 1944, Sergeant Harry George Colwell
RAFVR who was killed in action on the night of 12th/13th June 1944.
Although he crashed and is buried near Longueil with other members
of his aircrew, he was involved in an overnight raid in the hours
before D-Day. His target was a German fortification at Mont Fleury
on the high ground behind the 'Gold' landing beach near
Arromanches. We know that Mr Colwell lived in the house next to
Martin Wright, one of the Brockham Scout Leaders and his family at
one time lived in the home of the Grandparents of another of the
Brockham Scouts, Tom Budd.
This service will live in the minds of all the Scouts and
Leaders who visited Normandy in the summer of 2010 and enable us
the share the experience with future Scouts and the wider community
in Brockham with photographs and a video of our very poignant
experience.