Author: Jane Edwards

New Contact Details for Bereavements Services.

Bereavements Services Offices have moved over to a centralised telephone and email system. 

All calls should now be directed to 0121 216 2000 and emails to bereavement.services@birmingham.gov.uk

FBEC would suggest that,  if you are sending an email enquiry,  you should include BRANDWOOD END in the subject line.

There are several options when you ring, opening times, genealogy/finding a grave will be directed to www.birminghamburialrecords.co.uk (The grave records service is a chargeable service.  This is for burials up to 2015 if after that date it will advise which option to go to. )

Interesting maps

We thought members may be interested in these 2 maps. One shows the area of Brandwood End Cemetery as it was before the cemetery existed, but with the cemetery boundaries superimposed. The second shows the existing cemetery with the original 1838 map superimposed. Interesting to see the area of water marked originally on the bottom left of the map near Broad Lane.

Tantalising information.

Those of you that follow a series on Chanel 5 called ‘Planes that won the War’ will have seen, in the episode screened on the 1st of July, the story of 8 Air man who lost their lives when their Lancaster  crashed into ‘Ben Eighe’, a mountain in Scotland. The crash site was very remote, and still is.

One of those lost, their Navigator, lived very locally and is  buried in Brandwood End. We hope to feature his story in the near future, so watch this space.

Should any of his relatives read this, please contact us at friendsofbec@gmail.com as we would love to know more.

 

Civilian Garden looks glorious in the sunshine today.

We thought we would share with you these photos taken today on a warm summer morning in the Civilian Garden of Remembrance created in 1952 by Birmingham City Council as a memorial to the civilian dead of the 1939-45 war.

The newly restored benches, the mini rose trees and flourishing geranium plants in the four path beds are all examples of the contribution the Friends of Brandwood End Cemetery make to this special place.   We can indeed be proud of our efforts.

‘At the going down of the sun, and in the morning;

we will remember them.’

Armed Forces Day

Today is a chance to value the work our Armed Forces do. Fighting and peace keeping, emergency aid and pushing back the frontiers of medical science. Remember as well that many of those engaged in all of the above are Reservists.

  • Above is a photograph of 202 Field Hospital members on one of their annual visits to the cemetery to help the Friends with removed of trees and shrubs making some military graves inaccessible. Our thought today are focused on them and their various deployments around the world.