The town of Crawley in West Sussex was the town where I was born and grew up.

I knew it as a new town, a town that emerged out of the Second World War, but it was based

around a much older community.

And as I grew up and a childhood fascination with the Great War turned into something much more,

I realized that in the churchyards and the cemeteries and the streets of this town,

there were the traces of the Great War, the traces of the men of the Great War

from the town of Crawley and the surrounding villages of places like Eiffield and three bridges.

And in some of my earliest trips to the battlefields along the old front line,

I sought out the graves of men from the town who were listed on the panels of the

War Memorial. But one man who has taken that in recent decades to a very different level of

research is Rennie Richardson. Reni is also connected to the town of Crawley like I am

and as we'll discover he's written extensively on this subject

and is working on his third book now

so I'm pleased to be joined by Rennie Richardson

to discuss the men of Crawley who marched a war in 1914

and the names of the fallen of the town who were familiar to me

as I grew up there in the 1970s and 80s. So let's head for a trench chat with Rennie Richardson.

Well welcome to the old front line podcast, Rennie Richardson, and thanks for joining us,

Rennie. Thanks, Paul. It's great to be here. Nice to see you again.

You and I have got a connection to a little place in West Sussex called Crawley. I grew up in

Crawley, Newtown, as it was, of course, then, you know, born there in the late 60s

and spent a big chunk of my life there.

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