The 1942 Grave of Private Richmond Gerrard

This is a poignant image of Private Richmond Dix Gerrard's grave in 1942. He died while a Prisoner of War at Stalag XVIII A, Austria.

If a POW died whilst in a Work Camp, he was usually buried in the local cemetery. After the war, all of these men were reinterred in Klagenfurt War Cemetery.

According to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, 'Austria was annexed by Germany in March 1938, and many labour, prisoner-of-war and concentration camps were established there by the Germans. The principal POW camps were at Dollerscheim, Gneizendorf, Kaisersteinbruch, Leinz Drau, Spittal Drau and Wolfsburg Gratz. Commonwealth war dead buried in Austria were mainly servicemen who died in these camps in captivity, airmen who were shot down or crashed while flying over the country and those who died while serving with the army of occupation after the war. Klagenfurt, the only Commonwealth war cemetery in Austria, was begun in June 1945 by the British occupying forces, who moved graves into it from all over the country.' 

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Submitted by TeAwhi_Manahi on

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