Discovering a lost ancestor
Article
Jack Reynolds (BA History Graduate, 2014)
Roaby Henry A. Stacey was 33 years old when war broke out in August 1914. Born in 1881 into the rural working class he eventually married his wife Elizabeth in 1903 and later settled in Stisted, Essex, in the years thereafter. He was my great-great grandfather but always known within my family as my Grandmother’s Grandfather. Little was known about Roaby and his military service except his regiment and battalion, the 6th Queen’s Own (Royal West Kents), and his place and date of death on April 9th 1917 close to Feuchy on the outskirts of Arras, where he now rests. He had volunteered in Braintree in September 1914.
In early April 2014, as part of my third year special subject at Goldsmiths, I took part in a 4-day tour across the battlefields of France and Belgium where we visited many of the major battlegrounds, museums and cemeteries of the Western Front. Those included the Tyne Cot Cemetery and Memorial, the German Cemetery at Fricourt and the Menin Gate, where we were lucky enough to witness the Last Post.
On the final morning we visited the Wellington Quarry Museum in South-Eastern Arras where we toured the labyrinthine tunnels and caves that British troops were housed in during the build up to the Battle of Arras, which commenced on the morning of April 9th 1917, the day of Roaby’s death. One such regiment to reside for 8 days prior to the 9th were the Queens’ Own (Royal West Kents) and a detailed map within the quarry/museum showed their position on the 9th and objective that morning, the Feuchy crossroads, was almost certainly where Roaby was killed. We were able to view the numbered exits from which troops would have flooded that morning and the 97-year-old graffiti adorning the walls adds a distinctly personal element to the experience. The guided tour of the quarry further illuminated the final days of waiting for the West Kents as we learned of the field hospitals and mess halls, even a makeshift church, beneath the suburbs of Arras and the tireless efforts of the New Zealanders, who shored up and expanded upon the already-present cave network to provide a safe haven for the attacking forces. Allied gains on the morning of the 9th around Arras pay testament to this.
I was also able to visit Roaby’s grave, situated close to Wancourt, on the final evening of the tour and pay my respects for a few minutes. Subsequently after my return we found a photograph taken in 1921 by a relative who visited with the British Legion and it felt positive to know that I too have travelled a similar journey so close to the many centenaries that will become common-place over the next four years or so.
The tour of France and Belgium was unique in the sense that it inimitably contributed to my understanding of the First World War, so vital for my dissertation subject, but also allowed me to gain a comprehensive insight into final days of Roaby Stacey, an insight that for so long had been impeded a lack of solid information or the means of which to obtain it.
Roaby Stacey's grave photographed in 1921 The grave visited by Jack Reynolds
