A Parish at War

 Rob Forsyth

A Parish at War - A Military Record of Three Oxfordshire Villages Deddington - Clifton - Hempton was published on 11 November 2011(Remembrance Day) at the conclusion of a four year research project by myself and Michael Allbrook. He had researched the names on the War Memorial and was looking to publish the information. In the end we decided to research and record the names, with as much detail as possible, about those Deddington people - service and civilian, male and female - who had served their country from Waterloo to the present day. I undertook to do WWII and then to write and publsih the book. It contains many personal stories and hundreds of photographs which also recount how the parish 'kept the home firers burning'. Copies of the book are still available (2020) on Amazon HERE or can be borrowed fromj Deddington Library.

In the course of the research it was discovered that there were 25 men who had died for their country whose names are not on the original War Memorial. A decision was made to use the profit from sale of the book to pay for a new War Memorial Plaque to be placed in the church containing all the names of those who had died from the Boer War onwards. This plaque was dedicated by the Bishop of Dorchester on 16 June 2013.

The Press Release describing the project can be found HERE

Press reports in The Saturday Telegraph newspaper (15 June 2014) can be found HERE and the same day Saturday Telegraph OnLine HERE

The contents of the book and its later supplement together with full details of the Dedication Service - including links to replay the service (video and audio) and hear a BBC R4 Today article broadcast on the day - can be found in the index below.

Inevitably, more information about people in the book and some missing people has been discovered since publication. Please check on the names in the Personal Stories in the Further Research section.