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“If you think, have a kindly thought, If you speak, speak generously, Of those who as heroes fought And died to keep you free”
Set up by the Black Country Society. Our aim is to highlight local men who died in the Great War and how they have been commemorated on war memorials. Its scope covers the whole of the present Dudley Municipal Borough and therefore includes the places which have come within its bounds since 1914.
There are over fifty memorials and the number of names exceeds three thousand. Research on the names has been extensive but inevitably errors and omissions occur. We would like to hear about them concentrated on life and work before 1914, involvement in military campaigns and where each man is buried or commemorated.
Albert Oliver came from Cradley and attended Cradley C of E School and King Edward's School, Stourbridge, from 1905 to 1909. He enlisted in the Worcesters and was sent to the 1st Battalion in France who were very active in 1915 in Artois at Neuve Chapelle and Loos. In 1916 they were part of the opening attack on the 1st July at La Boisselle for the Battle of the Somme. After their losses they moved back to Loos and occupied the maze of trenches, both British and German, facing the Hohenzollern Redoubt. There were no attacks but much trench combat with bombs and mortars, sniping and patrols. Private Albert Oliver was killed on the 5th August and is commemorated on the Loos, Cradley, Halesowen, King Edward VI College, Stourbridge, and Cradley C of E School Memorials.
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ST JOHN THE BAPTIST CHURCH, High St, Halesowen, Dudley, West Midlands, England, B63 3BB
