Twenty four Edinburgh police officers who lost their lives in WW2 have been honoured in touching ceremony at the city’s The Royal High School.
Chief Superintendent David Robertson of Police Scotland presented Royal High staff and pupils and three other secondary schools present with a copy of a book which commemorates the officers’ bravery.
The Memorial Roll – Edinburgh City Police 1939-1945 by former Edinburgh City Police officer, Gerard McEwan, tells the heart-wrenching stories of the officers and staff of Edinburgh City Police who resigned for military service and who made the ultimate sacrifice.
Gerard was motivated to carry out the research that led to the book in order to create a permanent record of the largely forgotten lives of the young men.
He said: “Some of the men have not been previously acknowledged in a police memorial but the book rights this wrong and includes much more detail than can be written on a plaque or a cold stone structure.
“It is a sensitive account of personal tragedy gained through extensive research of military records and the collecting of reminiscences from other sources, including school records, family accounts, and a German U-Boat war diary.
“There was no memorial to the first man killed on duty, Assistant Chief Constable Robert Chisholm Thomson, who was shot during an Air Raid Warning in the city, by a drunken off-duty RAF Sergeant, and he is now included in the record.”
The “Memorial Roll” has been supported by the generous sponsorship of two ex-police officers, Gill Wallace and Steve Nunn, with two copies now donated to every secondary school in Edinburgh and to the reference section of all Edinburgh City Council libraries.
Staff and students of The Royal High School, Boroughmuir High School, George Heriot’s School, and Leith Academy, attended the presentation as seven of the 24 men commemorated in the book are former pupils and are listed in each school’s War Memorial.
The presentation was also attended by four guests from two families of men in the book, Charles William Nunn, and Alexander Campbell Scott. Both families assisted the research by contributing information and photographs that enabled a more detailed telling of their stories.
The guests were welcomed by Simon Ferriman, a Deputy Head Teacher at The Royal High school and seven students representing the four schools read out brief summaries of each man’s life before a two-minute silence was observed, ending by a piper playing “The Flowers of the Forest”.
A limited number of copies of the book are available from [email protected] priced at £15.00 which includes postage in the UK.
