218180 Pte. Charles H. Kirman British Army 7th Btn. Lincolnshire Regiment from:Furstow, Lincolnshire (d.23rd Sep 1917) Charles Kirman served with the Lincolnshire Regiment 7th Battalion.He was executed for desertion on23rd September 1917 and is buried in Ste. Catherine British Cemetery, Ste. Catherine, France.
Charles had served nine years in the Army then left to take a job in civvy street. He got married and started a family. When war was declared, Kirman was recalled to the Army. He fought at, and was injured in, battles at Mons and the Somme. Pte Kirman went AWOL (absent without leave) in November 1916, to visit his wife and children. Branded a coward when he surrendered to Military Police a couple of days later, he was court-martialled. At the age of 32 he was sentenced to death and in September 1917 he was shot at dawn1. His family believed he had been suffering from shell-shock, and his descendants campaigned to clear his name. Over 87 years later, the villagers and councillors finally reached an agreement with each other, that his name should be included, and fund-raising for a suitable memorial began.
Fulstow Village Hall had been built in honour of the three men and two women of Fulstow who had been killed in WWII, but it held no reference to the WWI casualties. In November 2005 a polished green granite commemorative plaque to all — including Pte Charles Kirman, was finally unveiled at Fulstow Village Hall. There were enough funds left over for an identical plaque to be installed at St Lawrence's Church, where a service took place on Armistice Sunday 2005, the first in living memory.
The village of Furstow in Lincolnshire did not have a war memorial for the seven local men who died during World War I until 2005.
The delay of 87 years was caused by disagreements over the inclusion of Private Charles Kirman.
During the war he was injured several times and sent home to recuperate but in September 1917 felt he could not take any more and went absent without leave.
After two days he handed himself in to the military police and was court martialled and shot at dawn.
Villagers decided not to put up a memorial following the war, after some local objection over Pte Kirman's inclusion. "There would have been somebody in the village who disagreed with it, so the rest of the families said 'if you're not having him, then you're not having our boys, because they all went to school together and worked together'."
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