I was looking through one of the updates and noticed this entry.
In days past, with poor communication channels, how often has something like this occurred?
Was he amused?
My great-grandmother received a widow's pension when her husband died in WWI.
I have a copy of the pension record card with a "cancelled" stamp across it. My great-grandfather had been a POW and returned at the end of the war.
We can't imagine this would happen now. I gather only the officers were recorded as POW's, and their families knew they were okay. There are no records of ordinary soldiers. Given my great-grandfather was good working-class stock, nothing. I assume this happened to many thousands of families.

Barry,
Forgive me if I have misunderstood this but, if I have gotit right, your ancestor was thought to have died and so the War Office paid hiswidow a pension. Later it emerged that he was still alive and so they stoppedit. Is that right? That seems pretty reasonable and logical to me. They wouldhave replaced it with his missing pay as a soldier, for the period they thoughthe was dead. So she wouldn’t have been out of pocket. In fact she’d have beenbetter off.

Elwyn

On Monday 5 May 2025 at 03:30:07 BST, barry woolner via CoTyroneList <cotyronelist@list.cotyroneireland.com> wrote:  

I was looking through one of the updates and noticed this entry.In days past, with poor communication channels, how often has something like this occurred?Was he amused?My great-grandmother received a widow's pension when her husband died in WWI.I have a copy of the pension record card with a "cancelled" stamp across it. My great-grandfather had been a POW and returned at the end of the war.We can't imagine this would happen now. I gather only the officers were recorded as POW's, and their families knew they were okay. There are no records of ordinary soldiers. Given my great-grandfather was good working-class stock, nothing. I assume this happened to many thousands of families.

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Hi Elwyn,

They did give her the pension until they discovered he was alive.
I agree this is logical. I wasn't complaining that  she was out of pocket.
I just thought that, given all these people assumed he was dead when he wasn't, it must have been quite a shock.
I was also amazed that many thousands of soldiers were POW's and nobody knew they were there.
From the National Archive-
"An estimated 192,000 British and Commonwealth servicemen were taken captive during the First World War. There is no comprehensive list covering all of these PoWs, and the surviving documents cover only a fraction of those who were captured.
There is a published List of British Officers taken prisoner in the various theatres of war between August 1914 and November 1918https://tna.koha-ptfs.co.uk/cgi-bin/koha/opac-detail.pl?biblionumber=29993. The list covers officers of the British Army, Royal Air Force, the Royal Naval Air Service and the Royal Naval Division. As well as names and rank, the book provides the date the officer went missing, where and when he was imprisoned and the date of his repatriation or death if the officer died while prisoner.
There is very little information anywhere on PoWs who were liberated after the Armistice on 11 November 1918.

From: Elwyn Soutter via CoTyroneList cotyronelist@list.cotyroneireland.com
Sent: 05 May 2025 16:15
To: barry woolner via CoTyroneList cotyronelist@list.cotyroneireland.com
Cc: Elwyn Soutter elwynsoutter@yahoo.co.uk
Subject: [CoTyroneMailingList] Re: whoops

Barry,

Forgive me if I have misunderstood this but, if I have got it right, your ancestor was thought to have died and so the War Office paid his widow a pension. Later it emerged that he was still alive and so they stopped it. Is that right? That seems pretty reasonable and logical to me. They would have replaced it with his missing pay as a soldier, for the period they thought he was dead. So she wouldn’t have been out of pocket. In fact she’d have been better off.

Elwyn

On Monday 5 May 2025 at 03:30:07 BST, barry woolner via CoTyroneList cotyronelist@list.cotyroneireland.com wrote:

I was looking through one of the updates and noticed this entry.
In days past, with poor communication channels, how often has something like this occurred?
Was he amused?
My great-grandmother received a widow's pension when her husband died in WWI.
I have a copy of the pension record card with a "cancelled" stamp across it. My great-grandfather had been a POW and returned at the end of the war.
We can't imagine this would happen now. I gather only the officers were recorded as POW's, and their families knew they were okay. There are no records of ordinary soldiers. Given my great-grandfather was good working-class stock, nothing. I assume this happened to many thousands of families.

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Join the list by sending an email to -  cotyronelist-subscribe@list.cotyroneireland.commailto:cotyronelist-subscribe@list.cotyroneireland.com
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