Finn
‘We’ll go and check there then,’ said Mum. But Philly looked sad, and I knew it was because she’d already checked those war graves online and none of them had a date that might match up with Ben’s being here.
J.W. Heavner
Pilot
Royal Canadian Airforce
12 August 1944
Age 21
Son of Harry and Clare Heavner
Flint, Mich., U.S.A.
So we knew it couldn’t be Ben in that grave either, but I made a rubbing anyway. Then Mum said, ‘Right, well, I think we’ve spent quite enough time in graveyards for one summer.’ And we got in the car and went home.
Philly showed me how to look up the records on the Commonwealth War Graves database when we got back to the house, because after I’d laminated the rubbing of his headstone I wanted to find out a bit more about John W.
Heavner. He’d been flying a plane called a Bristol Beaufighter, which was shot down by flak while attacking German shipping.
I wondered whether Ben had seen the plane fly over and heard the flak being fired. Maybe he had even been made to help dig the grave, because I could just imagine the Germans making prisoners do that sort of work.
Then I asked Philly if we could go through all the other records for war graves in cemeteries on the ?le de Ré, just to double-check again now we had concrete evidence that Ben had definitely been here.
She showed me how she’d searched the records.
There were two more cemeteries on the island with war graves that we hadn’t visited yet, but all the dates were wrong.
‘What a lot of war graves there are, just on this one small island,’ said Mum.
‘I know,’ said Philly. ‘It just goes to show.’
Then we were all quiet for a bit, thinking about all those people who’d been killed in the war, the ones whose graves we knew about and the ones we didn’t.
That evening, while we were having supper, Mum asked Philly what she’d like to do next. ‘You’re very welcome to stay longer if you’d like. But equally, we’ll understand if you want to get back.’
‘I’d love to stay longer, especially now we know Ben was actually here. But it’s probably time I thought about getting myself home,’ she said. ‘Perhaps I could stay a couple more days and get a flight booked for one day next week. Whatever is most convenient for you.’
‘We can’t thank you enough,’ said Dad. ‘For taking such good care of Finn.’
She laughed. ‘I think he took pretty good care of me. And Finn, you finding Ben’s name has been more than I ever hoped for.’
I’ve given her the laminated copy of the original rubbing to keep for the rest of her life and to show to the family. And I’ve put the photocopy into my collection instead.
‘Is there anything else you’d like to do before you leave?’ Mum asked her.
She shook her head. But then she thought a moment and said, ‘I think I’d like to go back to the cemetery up the lane one last time. I’ll say my goodbyes to the island there. And that pot of white heather we put on the grave of the unknown airman probably needs watering, don’t you think, Finn?’
I didn’t say that the old man would have watered it, because I’ve seen him do that to the pot plants left on other graves. I wanted to go back to the cemetery with her, and Mum couldn’t say no if it was what Philly wanted to do.