The final resting place of a lost hero of Dunkirk has finally been found more than 80 years later.
The body of Lieutenant Piers Edgcumbe, the son of the 6th Earl of Mount Edgcumbe, had been missing ever since he and a colleague were killed during the German Blitzkrieg in May 1940.
The Blitzkreig – which translates as ‘Lightning War’ – saw Adolf Hitler’s forces invade Luxuembourg, the Netherlands, Belgium and then France in the space of a week.
As 400,000 Allied soldiers stationed in France retreated towards the beaches of Dunkirk, the aristocratic officer, 25, and Lance Corporal Leonard Webber, 19, formed part of a forward reconnaissance unit.
Their highly-dangerous role was to make contact with the advancing enemy and report their position back to headquarters as officials sought to gauge the threat posed by Hitler’s troops.
But they were both killed when their armoured car was blown up by a German 88mm shell in the town of Esquelbecq, northern France.
The final resting place of a lost hero of Dunkirk has finally been found more than 80 years later. Lieutenant Piers Edgcumbe, the son of the 6th Earl of Mount Edgcumbe, had been missing ever since he and a colleague were killed during the German Blitzkrieg in May 1940
As 400,000 Allied soldiers retreated towards the beaches of Dunkirk, the aristocratic officer and Lance Corporal Leonard Webber were tasked with reporting the Nazis’ position. But they were both killed when their armoured car was blown up by a German 88mm shell in the town of Esquelbecq, northern France
They were hastily buried in a roadside grave before being exhumed and reburied side by side in the town’s cemetery 18 months later.
While Lance Corporal Webber was identified and given a marked grave, the same could not be said for Lieutenant Edgcumbe.
There was no way of identifying him and his body was placed underneath a headstone which simply listed an ‘unknown officer’.
While his family were made aware of his tragic fate they didn’t not know what happened to his body.
But the unmarked grave has at last been identified as that of Lieutenant Edgcumbe thanks to an amateur British military historian.
Andrew Newson set himself the task of finding out whose grave it was after visiting the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) Cemetery in 2003.
Over the past 17 years he has pieced together hundreds of documents from French and British archives to provide the CWGC with overwhelming proof that is it Lieutenant Edgcumbe’s grave.
They were hastily buried in a roadside grave before being exhumed and reburied side by side in the town’s cemetery 18 months later. While Lance Corporal Webber was identified and given a marked grave (left), the same could not be said for Lieutenant Edgcumbe. There was no way of identifying him and his body was placed in the unmarked grave with his headstone listed simply as an ‘unknown officer
Andrew Newson (pictured with his son Jacob) set himself the task of finding out whose grave it was after visiting the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) Cemetery in 2003. Over the past 17 years he has pieced together hundreds of documents from French and British archives to provide the CWGC with overwhelming proof that is it Lieutenant Edgcumbe’s grave
The commission has confirmed this and said he will be given a named headstone as soon as the Covid-19 travel restrictions are relaxed, hopefully by this summer.
Mr Newson, a former corporal in the British Army’s Royal Signals, said: ‘Bringing someone in from the cold like this is really quite hard to do as the CWGC require an overwhelming burden of proof especially with Dunkirk where there are 4,500 missing men from that six-week campaign.
‘I am very pleased and proud to be able to say that I had played a part in this happening.
‘I am really pleased that someone, and quite a prominent person as well, who has been unknown for over 80 years has now been identified.
‘I go to Dunkirk every year and the next time I go I will be able to tip my hat to him and lay a poppy cross on his grave and he will have a name.’
Lieutenant Edgcumbe, whose family seat was Mount Edgcumbe House on Cornwall’s Rame peninsula, served in the 12th Royal Lancers with the British Expeditionary Force in France in 1940.
Documents held in the National Archives at Kew, West London, showed that Lieutenant Edgcumbe and Lance Corporal Webber were listed as missing, believed killed, on the same day at a place just down the road from where they were buried. Pictured: The remains of their armoured vehicle after it was bombed
Lance Corporal Webber, from Chelsfield, Kent, served in the 2nd Battalion Queen Victoria Rifles.
Mr Newson, 52 and from Leeds, thought it was odd to find an officer and a soldier from two different regiments being killed on the same day – May 27, 1940 – and buried side by side.
He discovered that Lance Corporal Webber should have been fighting with his unit in Calais at the time but had been seconded for the reconnaissance missions at Dunkirk and served under Lieutenant Edgcumbe.
Documents held in the National Archives at Kew, West London, showed that Lieutenant Edgcumbe and Lance Corporal Webber were listed as missing, believed killed, on the same day at a place just down the road from where they were buried.
Lieutenant Edgcumbe was the only officer from the reconnaissance unit listed as missing on May 27.
Lieutenant Edgcumbe was the son of the 6th Earl of Mount Edgcumbe, who is pictured above in 1956
With the help of a French historian, Mr Newson obtained an exhumation report from a local mayor’s office dated November 26, 1942.
It contained a description of the dead officer which matched that of Lieutenant Edgcumbe including him having blond hair.
Mr Newson said: ‘I realised that all probability the officer missing on May 27 in that area was Piers Edgcumbe and that he was in that unmarked grave.
‘As the Allies were retreating so quickly bodies weren’t properly buried at the time.
‘After the British left and some normality returned to the area local people dug up the bodies and moved them to the cemetery because roadside graves were being turned into shrines.
‘In a letter from Edgcumbe’s commanding officer to the family, he stated he was there and he saw his armoured car hit by an anti-tank round and the car was burnt out with the bodies inside.’
Had he lived Lieutenant, Edgcumbe would have become the 7th Earl of Mount Edgcumbe.
Lieutenant Edgcumbe and Lance Corporal Webber were buried at Esquelbecq military cemetery 18 months after their bodies were exhumed from a makeshift roadside grave
His nephew, Piers Conolly McCausland, said: ‘Piers Richard Edgcumbe’s closest family are very pleased that his memory and his valour and his service for his country can be celebrated more fittingly now that his last resting place at the CWGC British military cemetry at Esquelbec, Northern France has been confirmed and his name is to be recorded on his headstone 80 years after he was killed in action alongside Lance Corporal Leonard Frank Webber, who is buried beside him.’
A spokesman for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission said: ‘We were presented with evidence proposing that Second Lieutenant Piers Richard Edgcumbe was buried at Esquelbecq Military Cemetery, partially identified as a British Officer.
‘Further research by CWGC led to a positive adjudication by the service authorities and the grave will now be marked as Second Lieutenant Edgcumbe’s final resting place.
‘A CWGC headstone will be installed, and a service of rededication will be arranged by the Joint Casualty and Compassionate Centre (JCCC), once the situation allows.’
Mount Edgcumbe House was badly bombed during the war.
After it was repaired and restored in the 1950s it was sold by the family to Cornwall Council and Plymouth City Council in 1971.
The two local authorities still own the estate today which is open to the public.
Chris Burton, Mount Edgcumbe manager, said: ‘Mount Edgcumbe House is delighted that Piers is no longer missing in action and he has a known grave.
‘An information panel telling his story and that of the bleak days of May1 940 can be found in the House along with a memorial chapel in his honour.’
The present holder of the Mount Edgcumbe aristocratic title is Robert Edgcumbe, 81, the eighth Earl.