Not dead
STILL LIVING
STILL LOVING
STILL MINE
PRIVATE CHARLES HENRY KENWARD
I love this inscription - Private Kenward's wife doesn't say "still loved, still missed, still mine", which is how people usually phrase this sentiment in newspaper 'In Memoriam' columns, but "still living, still loving, still mine", a fiercely positive assertion that death has not changed anything.
I haven't been able to find the cause of Kenward's death but the 3rd Battalion's War Diary (NB Kenward served in the 2nd Battalion in roughly the same area) gives an indication of conditions:
11 December 1916
Condition of the trenches indescribable. Men had to be dug out on the way up and in the trench by far the majority had to stand in mud above the knee, some with it above the waist. ...
12 - 14 December 1916
The weather conditions got still worse. It was intensely cold and the rain was punctuated with scuds of snow and sleet. ...
15 December
The men were in the most exhausted condition, being encased in mud up to their armpits and wet through. ...
16 December
... Some men who had been pulled out of the mud had lost their boots and in one case a man was dug and pulled out and then found deficient of his boots, socks and trousers.
WE STILL LOVE HIM DEARLY
SAPPER WG ARMSTRONG
Sapper Armstrong came from Oakenshaw, a small colliery village in Co. Durham. His mother was a widow. I think I've found him in the census: his Christian names were William George, the same as his father. His father was a miner and William George, the son, was quite possibly one too. I hope the Joseph Robert Armstrong killed in a mining accident at the colliery - crushed by a pit wagon - was no relation, but in a small community it's likely that he was.
William Armstrong was killed in April 1915. In 1919 his body was disinterred from its orginal grave and reburied in Ypres Town Cemetery Extension. It wouldn't have been until at least then that Mrs Armstrong was asked to finalise her choice of inscription, probably later. Her son had been dead more than four years, but as she was happy to declare for all to read, 'We still love him dearly'.