Review of ‘Youlgreave Remembers’, by Norman Wilson

This review is by Julie Bunting, and was published originally in The Peak Advertiser, the Peak District's local free newspaper, on 15th August 2005, and is reproduced with Julie's kind permission.

This publication is a special commemorative issue of The Bugle, a monthly magazine covering the Youlgrave area. A collection of largely personal records of wartime memories, Youlgrave Remembers captures events of the Second World War as they touched upon this village and its close neighbours.

The first chapter honours 10 local young men who laid down their lives in that war. We are shown their smiling faces and can even read the diary of a soldier who left a first-hand account of the D-Day Landing.

Some who survived the war add their own thoughtful recollections of what one man calls ‘the longest four years of my life’. A former Sherwood Forester tells of returning home on leave only to experience the ‘Youlgrave blitz’ - a subject which has a chapter to itself.

Soldier bridegrooms and war brides illustrate their stories with personal photographs, while one lady relates her husband's experiences as a Japanese PoW.

Accounts of ‘Life on the Home Front’ include the Home Guard, evacuees, German and Italian PoWs in the Peak and, very topically at present, Identity Cards.

Youlgrave Remembers has been researched and most enjoyably written by Norman Wilson, President of Youlgrave branch of the British Legion.

Review by Julie Bunting