Pte Emanuel Mentessi RSF died 16/5/1916

[Will O'Brien]

Information as per CWGC

Name: MENTESSI

Initials: E

Nationality: United Kingdom

Rank: Private

Regiment: Royal Scots Fusiliers

Unit Text: 6th Bn.

Date of Death: 16/05/1916

Service No: 19785

Casualty Type: Commonwealth War Dead

Grave/Memorial Reference: IV. E. 33.

Cemetery: VERMELLES BRITISH CEMETERY

[Will O'Brien]

Vermelles British Cemetery information........also from the CWGC

Cemetery: VERMELLES BRITISH CEMETERY

Country: France

Locality: Pas de Calais

Visiting Information: Wheelchair access with some difficulty. For further information regarding wheelchair access, please contact our enquiries department on telephone number 01628 634221.

Location Information: Vermelles is a village 10 kilometres north-west of Lens. From Lens take the N43, towards Bethune, to its junction with the D75 in Mazingarbe. Turn right at this junction and continue for approximately 900 metres when Vermelles British Cemetery will be found on the left hand side of the road.

Historical Information: Vermelles was in German hands from the middle of October to the beginning of December, 1914, when it was recaptured by the French. The cemetery was begun in August, 1915 (though a few graves are slightly earlier), and during the Battle of Loos (when the Chateau was used as a Dressing Station) Plot I was completed. It was laid out and fenced by the Pioneers of the 1st Gloucesters, and known for a long time as "Gloucester Graveyard". The remaining Plots were made by the Divisions (from the Dismounted Cavalry Division onwards) holding the line 1.6 kilometres East of the cemetery until April, 1917, and they incorporated a few isolated French graves of October, 1914. From April, 1917, to the Armistice, the cemetery was closed; but after the Armistice graves were brought in (to Plots II, IV and VI) from the battlefields to the East. There are now over 2,000, 1914-18 war casualties commemorated in this site. Of these, nearly 200 are unidentified and special memorials are erected to six soldiers from the United Kingdom, known to be buried among them. The cemetery covers an area of 9,259 square metres and is enclosed by low rubble walls.

No. of Identified Casualties: 1943

[christine liava'a]

Possibly

FreeBMD

Births Sep 1894

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Mentessi Ernest Bartholomew Poplar 1c 592

There seems to have been a family of Mentessis in Poplar during the late 1800s.

[Peter Beckett]

Interesting info from the 1901 Census

Pietro Mentiose 22 Italy Italian Subject London Poplar General Labourer

William Mentise 38 Italy Italian London St Marylebone Butler Domestic

Lorenzo Mentisse 32 Italy Italian Subject London Bromley Confectioner

No family named Mentessi although Lorenzo is close and no mention of Emanuel although if born in Poplar in 1894 he would have been 7 and certainly picked up by the Census

Peter

[BeppoSapone]

Interesting info from the 1901 Census

Pietro Mentiose 22 Italy Italian Subject London Poplar General Labourer

William Mentise 38 Italy Italian London St Marylebone Butler Domestic

Lorenzo Mentisse 32 Italy Italian Subject London Bromley Confectioner

No family named Mentessi although Lorenzo is close and no mention of Emanuel although if born in Poplar in 1894 he would have been 7 and certainly picked up by the Census

Peter

Don't expect the "Army" name to always be the correct family name for people of foreign origin killed during WW1.

As I understand it the army more or less guessed at a mans name, and sometimes got somewhere near the correct one.

I had a relative killed in WW1 who as far as the army and the CWGC are concerned was called "Morella". As the true family name is Marcella all that his family knew of him by the early 1990s was that he was killed in WW1. They also had a couple of photos of him, and in one he was clearly in the 12th London Regiment - "The Rangers".

Paul Reed advised me to look in "Soldiers Died" for someone with a similar name. I did so and found Rifleman "Morella", and the next-of-kin details were correct for the man in question.

Thanks to Paul Reed I was able to claim his medals on behalf of his sister, who was then in her 90s. They have now passed to her son, who was born in the early 1920s, and is actually named after the soldier.