howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
i hadn't realised you were offline because of computer problems john, just assumed you were busy with er erm other things.
you must be very young, my old man was in the 8th army in africa and southern italy.
Guest 660- Registered: 14 Mar 2008
- Posts: 3,205
Yes I am very young Howard it is the pressure of representing the people of Tower Hamlets that has aged me,actually my Mum was only 19 when I was born
If you knew what I know,we would both be in trouble!
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
seems that we both come from a military background john.
my old man was on omaha beach when the first shot was fired, under a bed in canning town by the time the next shot was fired.
Guest 671- Registered: 4 May 2008
- Posts: 2,095
Having been involved in creating the Miners Memorial Plaque on the base of the miner's statue, I would like to explain how difficult and stressful this can be for the organisers.
1000's of Miners have died through working in our mines and 1000's more will die because of the same reason.
They all deserve to be remembered, just as everyone involved in any other industry or military group does.
To put up a memorial like this has inherent complications, the team who put together our fatalities were extremely reluctant to allow me to put names to the plaque through concern, that they had made mistakes or omitted someone.
After several years of researching, I took the decision away from them and put names to the plaque. After years of asking family and friends to come forward with information, in every possible way, on the main, it was only after the plaque was opened, that people came forward to complain.
Every single person is hurt by these complaints because none of them ever wanted to make a mistake.
Our criteria was fatalities that occurred at our collieries, many died in hospital for instance, due to an accident at the pits and their family and ourselves agreed that they deserved to be on the plaque but that was not possible, a line has to be drawn for several reasons.
The importance of any memorial should be what the memorial represents, everyone involved should be remembered but sometimes it is just not possible to account for everyone by name.
"My New Year's Resolution, is to try and emulate Marek's level of chilled out, thoughtfulness and humour towards other forumites and not lose my decorum"