Een nieuwe grafsteen voor Lieutenant Leslie Harvey

Rededication Service for Lieutenant Leslie Harvey - Zillebeke - 29/04/2026

On Wednesday, 29 April 2026, at 14:30 hours, a ceremony was held at the British Sanctuary Wood Cemetery in Zillebeke. Lieutenant Leslie Harvey was given a new gravestone bearing his name, thanks to research that proved he was indeed buried there.

Leslie Harvey was born in Windsor in January 1884, the only child of parents Cecil Allenby Harvey - a bank manager, and his wife Ann Amey. Sadly, Leslie's mother died when he was just a year old. Leslie was educated at Eastbourne and Isleworth schools, and trained as a sollicitor.

He joined the Inns of Court Officer Training Corps, and at the outbreak of war volunteered immediately, being given a commission in the Middlesex Regiment on 28 August 1914. Leslie was sent to Gibraltar with the Regiment in October 1914, and was promoted to Lieutenant in February 1915. Following a short period of leave in England he was sent to France, in late February - early March 1915.

By April 1915 Leslie had reached Belgium and was engaged in fighting in the Zonnebeke area. On 25 April 1915 he was killed whilst leading a bayonet charge. Although he was buried by his men at the time - near a railway crossing - the records of his grave were lost, and following the war he was named on the Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing at Ypres.

In early 1929, the body of an unknown Lieutenant of the Middlesex Regiment was recovered from a location just south of the Ypres-Roulers railway - identified by a shoulder title, and his badges and buttons. It was impossible to determine his personal identity and he was buried as an unknown Lieutenant at Sanctuary Wood Cemetery, alongside two other men recovered at the same place and time.

Recently research has connected this unknown Lieutenant to Leslie Harvey, and allowed us to identiy his final resting place. His grave was therefore rededicated accordingly.