WW1 - Exhumation of Internee George Staller

From Mona's Herald, Wednesday, February 27, 1918,

GERMAN PRISONER AND BRITISH SOLDIERS. BURIED IN COMMON GRAVE.
EXHUMATION OF GERMAN APPLIED FOR.

At a Consistorial Court , held in Douglas on Saturday, before the Vicar-General (Mr C. T. W. Hughes-Games), there was an application by H.M. Attorney-General, at the relation of Lieut.-Colonel Madoc. Commandant of the Enemy Alien Detention Camp, Douglas, for a faculty, authorising the exhumation of a coffin containing the dead body of Georg Staller, deceased, a prisoner of war. with a view to the re-interment of such coffin in another grave.

The application was with notice to the Douglas Corporation, proprietors and custodians of the Douglas Borough Cemetery. Mr R. B. Moore appeared for the Attorney-General.

The application stated that Georg Staller. a German prisoner of war, died at the Douglas Camp on March 4th. 1916, and was buried in grave H271 of the Borough Cemetery on March 6th 1916. In December, 1914, a member of the Royal Defence Corps, named George Fred Holmes, had been buried in the same grave; and on March 6th 1916, another member of the Royal Defence Corps, named John Drinkwater, had also been buried in the same grave. The German, it will be noticed, was buried between the two British soldiers, and the relator asked that the German should be exhumed and re-interred in another grave - H268.

The Lockman (Mr C. C. Quirk ), said the notice had been left with the Deputy Town Clerk at the Town Hall.

In reply to a question by the Vicar-General. Mr Moore said the cemetery had been consecrated. -
The Vicar-General: Otherwise, I could not have dealt with the matter.-
Mr Moore said the grounds of the application were that it was undesirable that a prisoner of war and British soldiers should be buried in the same grave. Another difficulty was that there was a desire to erect a monument over Staller.

The Vicar-General said that there was considerable indecency in the idea of an alien prisoner being buried in the same grave as two members of H.M. Forces. He took it too, that the Attorney-General moved as representing the Crown, and also as representing the Military Anthorities, who naturally resented that soldiers should be buried with prisoners. -
Mr Moore : It is on the ground of sentiment.-
The Vicar-General: I can understand it being highly objectionable to members of their families.
Mr Moore stated that the German Committee wished to place a headstone on Staller's grave, and the relatives of the soldiers wished to do the same.
Major Bland, assistant-commandant of the Douglas Camp, said that the facts as stated in the petition were true.
In answer to the Vicar-General, witness stated that he had letters from the Brigadier-General and the soldiers' comrades, protesting against soldiers being buried in the same grave as an alien. The interment was due to a mistake.

A faculty was granted as prayed for. The body to be exhumed at night after the closing of the cemetery to the public, and in the presence of the Medical Officer of Health of the Borough and the Caretaker of the Borough Cemetery.

George Staller, internee number 2017 noted as aged 19 in the I.C.R.C. records though this might be age at start of his internment as aged 21 in local records, address Pirmasens Bayern Schlossstr 3, is noted by Madoc as having died at 3pm in the Camp - I.C.R.C records states from Pulmonary TB.

Any comments, errors or omissions gratefully received The Editor HTML Transcription © F.Coakley , 2019