Deleted account 231211001
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Since retiring I've signed up for and got stuck into the Commonwealth War Graves Commission's "Eyes On Hands On" volunteer programme.
In essence there's loads of folks who , after the required training, look after the CWGC assets in their allocated/chosen cemeteries. It is as simple as visiting with the list of assets printed out, checking on the state of those assets, doing any minor cleaning of headstones and removing any overgrown greenery to reveal the asset for all to view. The headstones are referred to assets by the way as some are wholly owned by the CWGC but many are private memorials which are administered by and managed by the CWGC where families declined a standard white headstone.
I find it both rewarding and beneficial to the families who may be looking for lost relatives, and anyone researching the first and second wars. But... the CWGC are still looking for volunteers. There's thousands of sites with enourmous numbers of assets to keep an eye on.
If it's something that floats your boat and you've a couple of hours spare hither and yon, it's well worth registering your interest here: https://www.cwgc.org/our-work/volunteer/
As an example, here in Manchester there is one cemetery with over 350 assets to look after, and that is some task! I look after two locations which take me a year to cover and they have less than 160 between them. Once they are catalogued and photographed ( uploaded to the CWGC site for all to see) , that's the actual work complete. After that it's maintenance and reporting of any damages, any where tree roots are threatening to tip headstones over, and where weathering is starting to obscure the details.
In essence there's loads of folks who , after the required training, look after the CWGC assets in their allocated/chosen cemeteries. It is as simple as visiting with the list of assets printed out, checking on the state of those assets, doing any minor cleaning of headstones and removing any overgrown greenery to reveal the asset for all to view. The headstones are referred to assets by the way as some are wholly owned by the CWGC but many are private memorials which are administered by and managed by the CWGC where families declined a standard white headstone.
I find it both rewarding and beneficial to the families who may be looking for lost relatives, and anyone researching the first and second wars. But... the CWGC are still looking for volunteers. There's thousands of sites with enourmous numbers of assets to keep an eye on.
If it's something that floats your boat and you've a couple of hours spare hither and yon, it's well worth registering your interest here: https://www.cwgc.org/our-work/volunteer/
As an example, here in Manchester there is one cemetery with over 350 assets to look after, and that is some task! I look after two locations which take me a year to cover and they have less than 160 between them. Once they are catalogued and photographed ( uploaded to the CWGC site for all to see) , that's the actual work complete. After that it's maintenance and reporting of any damages, any where tree roots are threatening to tip headstones over, and where weathering is starting to obscure the details.
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