Belleville Historical Society Remembers WWI British Royal Marine

BELLEVILLE, NJ — The following news release comes courtesy of the Belleville Historical Society. Find out how to post announcements or events to your local Patch site.

One hundred and six years ago, on April 8, 1918 during the Great War, (the war to end all wars) a company of Royal British sailors and marines gathered on a quiet hillside to lay a comrade to rest...not in Europe...but in North Bergen, New Jersey.

Private Bertram Venables was a 31-year-old Royal Marine Light Infantry of the British battleship HMS Dominion. Venables died from pneumonia during a port call to New York on August 4, 1918. A funeral service was held for him four days later at Volk's Funeral Chapel in Hoboken followed by the burial in nearby North Bergen.

Four years ago, the Belleville Historical Society was doing restoration work in Flower Hill Cemetery on the monuments of two Medal of Honor recipients, Civil War Sgt. Decatur Dorsey and World War 1 Sgt. Frank Bart. During their work there, they were very surprised to discover the grave of a British marine, 3,000 miles from home. Since then the Society has included the British soldier along with Dorsey and Bart on their annual Christmas wreath list. The Society has been trying to learn more about the soldier and why he never was returned home to Britain, where he lived in a district in London.

On Sunday, April 7, the Society visited Private Venables' somewhat lonely gravesite, just 200 feet from the busy and noisy Rt 1&9. To commemorate the anniversary of his passing the Society decorated Private Venables' grave with a Cross and a British and an American flag.

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