James Roddy. Gunner Roddy was a POW during ww2 and has laid without a grave stone for 36 years. He is not entitled to a military stone because he died after 1947 which i think is awful as he served for our country. He enlisted with the British Army in 1939 having worked as a credit salesman in Ards. He was captured in Torbruk on June 21,1942 and sent to a prisoner of war camp in Italy and escaped from there.

“James was recaptured 10 days later by the Germans and was sent to Stalag IV prisoner of war camp in Mulberg-on-Elbe in November 1943.He was held in the Mittweida work camp and got a job in the cement works but again escaped and this time made his way to American lines from where he was reunited with the British forces.He made it back to Newtownards where he got a job at the Ulster Print Works and lived quietly with his wife Jane until her death in 1963. And 16 years later he died aged 69 and he was buried, but no head stone has ever been dedicated to him