Historian reveals how Dorset sailor died in Siberia

THE STORY of how a young West Dorset farm labourer came to be murdered in Siberia is uncovered in the November issue of the excellent parish magazine, the Eggardon & Colmer’s View.

The fate of Harry Marsh has been researched, ahead of Remembrance Day, by the military historian Richard Connaughton, who lives in Nettlecombe.

Harry Marsh was born in 1893. He left Powerstock for the Navy in 1912, survived World War I, and was by 1918 a Petty Officer (Stoker) on HMS Carlisle. In the summer of 1919, the ship sailed for Russia. Her mission was to help defeat the Bolsheviks who had led the Russian Revolution.

Harry Marsh was killed on 22 October, 1919, in what Mr Connaughton calls the “lawless frontier port” of Vladivostok.

“He was shot to death whilst walking along a lonely road in Vladivostok by a person unknown. This suggests that Marsh was robbed… He was buried in the Lutheran section of the Pokrovskaya Cemetery.”

This is the barest of summaries. Mr Connaughton’s full article can be found on page 19. (The magazine has plans for a website but nothing at the moment beyond an ‘under construction’ page).

I’ve reproduced some of the facts here, firstly because they show what startling human details lie behind the letters that we see on memorials like the one in Powerstock church that lists ‘H. Marsh. HMS Carlisle’.

Secondly, because Mr Connaughton also mentions a project that I’d never heard of.

This is the UK National Inventory of War Memorials, an archive of Britain’s 100,000 war memorials, which aims eventually to record as much information as possible about every one of them. (The appeal for money to help achieve this, incidentally, is led by Paul Atterbury of BBC Antiques Roadshow fame who has lived for several years in Eype near Bridport, but is now, according to the selfsame issue of the Eggardon & Colmer’s View, moving to Weymouth).

Anyway, the url for the archive is at http://www.ukniwm.org.uk/

There are ten entries for Bridport alone, five for Lyme Regis (including the clock tower in the Cobb Gate car park), and four for Beaminster, including this from St Mary’s church:

In loving memory of/ Cecil Collins Hann/ 2nd Lieut. Royal Flying Corp/ Son of Albert and Edith Hann of Beaminster/ Who was Killed in Action in the air during the Battle of the Somme, Oct. 22nd 1916. Aged 25 years/ His body was laid to rest at Heilly, Mericourt L’Abbe, France

“GREATER LOVE HATH NO MAN THAN THIS. THAT A MAN LAY DOWN HIS LIFE FOR HIS FRIENDS” S. JOHN XV.13