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Local Heroes from Around the World by Ian Chambers
Men from all of the area that now makes up Milton Keynes served in the armed forces during the Great War. The 'Soldiers Died In The Great War' database, (British Army), gives the following figures of men who declared their place of residence as being in the city area when they joined up:

Newport Pagnell 83 North Crawley 5 Astwood 1
Bletchley 55 Emberton 4 Filgrave 1
Wolverton 48 Little Brickhill 4 Haversham 1
Olney 36 Bow Brickhill 3 Lathbury 1
Woburn Sands 31 Newton Blossomville 3 Loughton 1
Stony Stratford 26 Stoke Goldington 3 Milton Keynes 1
Hanslope 15 Wavendon 3 Moulsoe 1
Old Bradwell 7 Weston Underwood 3 New Bradwell 1
Fenny Stratford 6 Calverton 2 Ravenstone 1
Sherington 5 Woughton 2

This, of course, only records those that died; it does not include the many that returned.

It also does not record the many men from this area that fought in the uniform of another country. The local memorials do however, in many cases, record the names of those who had travelled to the far-flung corners of the Empire to start a new life but returned to Europe in the uniform of their adoptive countries to lay down their lives in the mud of France and Belgium for the old country.

The memorial in Queensway, Bletchley, commemorates three such men:

Francis John Vasey was working as a farm hand in Australia

Cyril Ralph Hill was working as a box maker in Canada, and

Robert James Warr was working as a stoker in New Zealand.

Here you may find out more about them...


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