Downton Abbey ‘shame’ of a Great War hero’s widow
WILLIAM GARDNER was one of 13 volunteers from a picturesque village who died in the First World War. He would normally have been granted hero status.
But the married father of two has been written out of local folklore in an act that could have come straight from the period ITV drama Downton Abbey.
The names of 12 Great War soldiers are etched into the stone Cross of Sacrifice memorial at Fenny Compton in Warwickshire.
But Mr Gardner’s name is conspicuous by its absence thanks to the morals of the strict society in which he lived.
Gardner, a 31-year-old who died at the Second Battle of Ypres in 1915, did nothing wrong. The dishonour came from his wife Jane.
The couple had two daughters. But after he died on the Western Front she produced two more children out of wedlock by separate fathers.
Jane became an outcast and the scandal was uppermost in minds when a committee was assembled to raise funds for a 10ft-high memorial at the heart of the village.
It is incredible to think that he was written out of history because of the actions of his grieving widow who was trying to build a new life.
Jennifer Cranfield, a local historian, said: “It just wasn’t the done thing back then and they deliberately left his name off. It was not an oversight.
“It is incredible to think that he was written out of history because of the actions of his grieving widow who was trying to build a new life.”
The saga echoes the Downton storyline of a maid, played by actress Amy Nuttall, who has the illegitimate child of a recuperating officer and is forced to live in isolation because of the disgrace.
But the absence of Mr Gardner’s name on the weathered granite memorial is a very real example of how children being born out of wedlock were viewed at that time.
He signed up for the local battalion, the 1st Royal Warwickshire Regiment, and gave Fenny Compton as his home address. Within a month he was among 600 dead from his battalion.
It is believed he was killed in a bombardment while in a forward-line trench after the main battle subsided. He is buried at Talana Farm cemetery at Ypres with full military recognition of his honourable death.
Parish records at Fenny Compton show his death was greeted with sadness. He was described as “one of our own”.