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Old soldier found in the Nederlands

Article about: jerry i missed this one first time round ,great link

  1. #1

    Default Old soldier found in the Nederlands

    An interesting article (for my 5000th post) in the news about the discovery of the remains of a British soldier from the forgotten war of 1799 when Britain launched a small scale invasion of the Northern Nederlands during the Great war against France.

    BBC News - Mystery of 200-year-old British soldier found in the dunes of Holland

    Battle of Castricum - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

    "The 200-year-old body of a British Coldstream Guards soldier was found in sand dunes in the Netherlands. Who was he?

    For more than two centuries, the remains of a soldier lay undisturbed on a windy beach in the northern Netherlands.

    But in March 2011, birdwatchers discovered bones and metal artefacts among sand-dunes that had once been covered in asphalt.

    The find was near an area known as the "Bonehole" because of the number of historic remains that had previously been unearthed.

    A team of archaeologists was called in to dig further. Among them was 28-year-old Esther Poulus, whose involvement was to lead her to the National Archives in Kew, Surrey, in an attempt to discover the identity of the fallen soldier.

    "We were taken to the site by the person who made the find, and it was quite hard to see," she recalls. "You could only see it if you were really close, and even then it was only the larger bones from the legs that were visible. The bones were very degraded and mixed with the ground."

    Continue reading the main story
    The 2nd Regiment


    There were two battalions of the Coldstream (or 2nd) Regiment of Foot Guards in 1799. Each battalion had about 1,000 officers and soldiers, says Colonel Simon Vandeleur.

    The Coldstream Guards trace their ancestry back to 1650 and Cromwell's New Model Army, he says. At the restoration of Charles II, their commander General Monck was instrumental in handing military control back to parliament and re-establishing a monarchy.

    Unwilling to be known as the 2nd Foot Guards, says Vandeleur, they adopted as their motto "Nulli Secundus" or second-to-none and were called the Coldstream Guards. Coldstream was the town in Scotland from which they had commenced their long march a year earlier to London, to restore order and set the conditions for the restoration of the monarchy.

    The regiment served in the French revolutionary war 1793-1802 and fought at Lincelles. They saw service in Egypt in 1801. They also served in the Peninsular War 1808-1814, fighting in northern Portugal in 1809. They served in the Hundred Days War 1815 and played a critical part in the defence of Hougoumont farm at the battle of Waterloo, along with the 3rd Guards, now known as the Scots Guards.

    She and her colleagues had to sift carefully through the sand using a brush and trowel, piecing together the remains of the body. They were working against the clock, as they had only been given two days on the site because a rare bird was about to start nesting, and the local government were keen for it not to be disturbed.

    They had suspected that the body might be that of a soldier, given the area's association with a particular 18th Century battle. But the nationality of the soldier might have remained a mystery if it had not been for clues that had been left behind - muskets and tell-tale items of clothing.

    In August 1799, Britain and Russia launched an invasion of northern Holland in an effort to topple the Batavian Republic and restore the House of Orange. The action formed part of the wars against revolutionary France, which supported the Dutch republic.

    The British-Russian armies - including the 2nd Battalion Coldstream Guards, consisting of some 1,000 soldiers - arrived in Groote Keeten under the Duke of York. About 12,000 British soldiers were landed in total.

    "It was a really special dig, as we knew instantly this was a period that wasn't very well known," Poulus recalls. "In the Netherlands, they call it the forgotten war - it didn't take very long, and was quite local."

    The soldier was buried in his uniform, along with several muskets, which may simply have been thrown in the grave to dispose of them, or may have been fashioned into some kind of makeshift stretcher to carry his body to its resting place.

    "When we found the buttons he had worn on his tunic, we thought, 'Wow - we can identify this soldier.'"

    The team from Hollandia Archeologen brought in Cor Prins, an archaeological conservationist with a particular interest in the area's military history, to study the fragile pewter buttons.

    He identified them as belonging to a member of the Coldstream Guards from the regiment's distinctive star and cross, which was barely visible on one of them. He was also able to make out the words "COVEN GARDEN", indicating that it had been made by a button-maker based in London's Covent Garden.

    Continue reading the main story

    The button on the Coldstream Guards uniform is composed of an eight-pointed star of the Order of the Garter
    A belt and buckle within the star contain the inscription "honi soit qui mal y pense" or "evil be to those who evil think"
    A cross of St George is at the centre of the star
    As the "second" regiment of foot guards, Coldstream Guards wear their buttons in pairs
    The brevity of the campaign - the British army had only been in the area for a day - helped the team date the soldier's remains. His torso had crumbled, and - crucially - he didn't have a head, which means that it may never be clear what killed him.


    A museum in Northern Holland has constructed a life-sized replica of a Coldstream Guard from the era
    After excavating the remains, Esther took up what became a personal quest to see whether the soldier could be identified, and - if possible - brought home. She has been partially successful, getting in touch with Coldstream Guards veterans via their website, and arousing interest from the regiment in the soldier's repatriation.

    The Ministry of Defence in the UK does not deal with the repatriation of such historic remains, while the Commonwealth War Graves commission does not handle pre-1914 remains. So it was up to the regiment itself to engage with the Dutch authorities to decide what to do.

    In the meantime, the unknown soldier's remains were stored at the local government depot for archaeological finds in northern Holland. But finally, on 2 May they will be handed over in Haarlem, in a child-sized wooden coffin to the British ambassador and representatives of the Coldstream Guards. A regimental musician is due to play the Last Post before Captain Oliver Morley brings the remains back home to the Regimental HQ.

    Poulus's tenacity may have succeeded in narrowing down the identity of the soldier a little.

    "The state of the bones meant we could not have done DNA testing, as they were too degraded, and usually you would use teeth for DNA. We have nothing to compare it with," she says.

    Continue reading the main story
    1799 invasion of Holland

    After the French Revolution in 1789, the influence of France was felt in the Netherlands.

    Willem V, Prince of Orange-Nassau, had fled to England in 1795 and the Batavian Republic was established.

    In summer 1799 the British sent an army into Holland to drive out the French and restore the exiled House of Orange.

    Poulus says that her research in the National Archives at Kew yielded six possible names, with Nathaniel Haines and Thomas Taylor the two most likely.

    "The archives in the UK show that the two soldiers I think it could be were in the most dangerous jobs, as grenadiers. Judging by his remains, our soldier was probably around 1.80m tall, which was tall for the time. And the grenadiers recruited the tallest. So it's just a hunch, and a feeling I got when I saw the names."

    So far, though, no way has been found to narrow this down, and the Coldstream Guards are not optimistic.

    "Both are quite common surnames, and between 1790 and 1801 we had 12 Thomas Taylors who were serving in the Coldstream Guards," says retired Colonel Simon Vandeleur, the regimental adjutant who has been key in organising the repatriation. "The archaeologist's report is very good, but I don't think we can absolutely pin it down to two possibilities."

    Continue reading the main story

    Skeletal remains discovered at the site in March 2011 were found alongside other material, including uniform, bullets and muskets
    Continue reading the main story
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    "The regimental archives show well over 100 people killed in 1799 in the Coldstream Guards, and unfortunately some of the archives were damaged in the Blitz. At the time, they didn't look after those records very well - if a soldier died they destroyed his record, as they no longer needed to pay a pension, though we have got the archivist looking through the 1799 box," he says.

    If the regiment can pinpoint a name, it will try to find the soldier's descendants, though Vandeleur admits it seems unlikely.

    "But we will try. If not, Plan B is to cremate the remains, and scatter his ashes on Horse Guards Parade before the Trooping the Colour with due dignity and ceremony, and the guardsmen of Number 7 Company Coldstream Guards - his descendants - can tramp his ashes into the welts of their boots on one of the nation's most famous parade grounds, 200 years later. I hope it will be a fitting resting place for an unknown soldier who died long ago, doing his duty."

    Poulus's archaeological report on the find opens with a quotation from Rupert Brooke's The Soldier:

    "If I should die, think only this of me

    That there's some corner of a foreign field

    That is forever England."

    Soon, though, this one soldier will come home at last."

    Copied from the BBC news article in case the link vanishes.
    Last edited by Jerry B; 05-02-2013 at 06:10 PM.
    Regards,

    Jerry

    Whatever its just an opinion.

  2. #2

    Default Re: Old soldier found in the Nederlands

    Way to go Jerry!
    Congrats on your 5.000 th post!And I hope many more are to come!
    About the article; thise shows how important "buttons" can be! ;-)
    They are more or less the dog tags "avant-la-lettre"!
    cheers
    |<
    Always looking for Belgian Congo stuff!
    http://out-of-congo.eklablog.com/

    cheers
    |<ris

  3. #3

    Default Re: Old soldier found in the Nederlands

    Thanks for sharing Jerry.
    Congrats on your 5000th post.
    You are one of the biggest assets of the forum
    Last edited by don_kihotis7; 11-12-2013 at 11:28 PM.
    Looking for the photo albums of Leutnant Emil Freitag, 3. / G.R. 377

  4. #4
    ?

    Default Re: Old soldier found in the Nederlands

    Thanks for the info Jerry I have an ex Coldstreamer here.. we never here the last of it!!! Coldstream this Coldstream that....lol.. Very interesting thread. Cheers Terry.

  5. #5
    ?

    Default Re: Old soldier found in the Nederlands

    Wow, interesting news.

  6. #6

    Default Re: Old soldier found in the Nederlands

    Quite interesting Jerry!
    Thanks for sharing.
    Ralph.
    Searching for anything relating to, Anton Boos, 934 Stamm. Kp. Pz. Erz. Abt. 7, 3 Kompanie, Panzer-Regiment 2, 16th Panzer-Division (My father)

  7. #7
    ?

    Default Re: Old soldier found in the Nederlands

    5000 posts, my compliments Jerry on always insightful and learned commentary, this post being no exception!

  8. #8

    Default Re: Old soldier found in the Nederlands

    Thanks Jerry - Excellent 5000th post - It's a fascinating
    story, and it's true what Kris says about buttons
    being important..........
    Regards,


    Steve.

  9. #9
    ?

    Default Re: Old soldier found in the Nederlands

    Congrats Jerry! That is amazing because where this occurred was literally miles from my grandparents house in holland! What an amazing find!

    Ryan

  10. #10

    Default

    Moved this to the new button forum as it shows how important buttons can be IMHO.
    Regards,

    Jerry

    Whatever its just an opinion.

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