He told me that the working party had a successful day's work in the churchyard the other day and all graves, including John Crossman's, are looking much neater. The grass had grown rather long because, my friend seems to remember, the previous monthly working party had been rained off. This time, despite the forecast of rain, it remained dry but it was not easy work.
Sitting here so far away in Australia, it is wonderful to know that John Crossman and others who, like him, fell in war are being cared for so well by the dedicated men and women of Chalfont St Giles.
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Extract from Australian Eagles: Australians in the Battle of Britain
John was the first man killed in the Second World War to be buried in Chalfont St Giles and the village grieved his loss as if he were one of their own. Indeed, he was buried as one of their own: ‘Ordinarily’ wrote Ann Brawn [John Crossman's aunt] to her brother, ‘it would have cost £50 to bury him but our rector let him be laid at ease as one of us’. Many villagers sent flowers and attended the funeral. John’s aunts sent a cross of bronze chrysanthemums and ordered another of laurel leaves, white chrysanthemums and red carnations on behalf of John’s parents, and sprays of Michaelmas daisies from his sister Joan and Patricia Foley. The young pilot was buried in the local churchyard beside his aunt, Florence Crossman, as Ann thought her brother would rather his son be ‘laid here than among strangers’.
John's family made the right decision in burying him in Chalfont St Giles. He is still considered 'one of us'.
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(John's grave before it's regular spruce up, when the poppies are in bloom)
http://www.kristenalexander.com.au/books/australian-eagles
