PRIVATE JOHN C CROWE
SEAFORTH HIGHLANDERS
7TH OCTOBER 1917 AGE 33
BURIED: ARBROATH EASTERN CEMETERY, UK
Private Crowe's inscription comes from a conventional piece of memorial verse, which often appeared in the In Memoriam columns of newspapers:
Peacefully sleeping, resting at last,
His weary trials and troubles past,
In silence he suffered, in patience he bore,
Till God called him home to suffer no more.
However, I have an ominous feeling that there may be more behind the words of this inscription than simple convention. Thirty-three-year-old John Crowe is buried in the cemetery of his home town of Arbroath. His medal card shows that he served initially with the Black Watch, army number S/18318, and then with the 4th Battalion Seaforth Highlanders, army number S/40821, and that he was entitled to the British War Medal and the Victory Medal, in other words that not only had he served overseas (the War Medal) but he had entered a theatre of war (the Victory Medal). This raises the question as to why he was buried at home.
His inscription probably provides the answer, either he died at home from a lingering terminal illness or from wounds received in action. Men with the worst wounds were sent back to Britain to be cared for and to die. Private Crowe's inscription was perhaps meant literally:
In silence he suffered
In patience he bore
Till God called him home
To suffer now more.