“Finally Found”
Sapper Joseph Shepherd’s Official War Grave was dedicated with respect in a special family service at Friends of Farsley Rehoboth on Friday 16th August 2024.
The story begins in the first months of World War Two. Joseph Shepherd lives at Oakwell Terrace, Farsley, he is 19 years old and married with a six month old daughter.
A Territorial volunteer, working at Butlers of Stanningley as a scaffolder (as was his father, also called Joseph) he is called up as a Royal Engineer to serve in a searchlight unit, tracking German bombers crossing northern England on night time raids.
He dies of illness in January 1940, although the army records describe him as “missing in action” with his name carved on the 1940 -1942 Memorial to the Missing at Brookwood Cemetery, Surrey.
In late 2023, our researchers discover that Joseph is buried, alongside his father in a previously unmarked grave in Plot E3 in Farsley Rehoboth Burial Ground, Coal Hill Lane. In 2021 our volunteers had placed a grave marker and inscribed plaque on the grave, but most of the personal details were not in our records at that time.
It is quickly discovered that both Joseph and his father are at rest in the same grave and we commence working with the Commonwealth War Graves Commission to commission an official headstone, this we received in July 2024 and dedicated last Friday.
We also discover that Joseph’s daughter (Joyce) now in her eighties, is living at East Bierley, Bradford with no prior family knowledge of his resting place as the army had not recorded his place of death or burial - he was truly an “Unknown Warrior”.
In a rare occurrence, (and becoming rarer as each year passes) Joyce, as her father’s next of kin composes the personal message inscribed on his headstone; “Always in my heart” and writes “Finally Found” on a Poppy Cross, with many of her family present at the service and others due to visit in the coming weeks.
The dedication service includes Standard Bearers from the Royal Engineers Association and the Royal British Legion, Bugler Darren Walker playing “The Last Post” and “Reveille” and Deputy Lieutenant of West Yorkshire, Colonel Stephen Boardman MBE DL.
The service concluded with a daughter reunited with her father.
“Always in my heart”, Joyce with her father
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