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On This Day

23

Sep
2016

In On This Day

By Nicola Gauld

On This Day, 23 September 1916

On 23, Sep 2016 | In On This Day | By Nicola Gauld

Birmingham Daily Post

Saturday 23 September 1916

GERMAN PRISONER’S DEATH IN BIRMINGHAM.

BISHOP OFFICIATES AT THE FUNERALS

Robert Hoftner, a German prisoner of war, who died from wounds at the 1st Southern General Hospital, Bournbrook, on Tuesday, was buried with military honours at Lodge Hill Cemetery yesterday morning. The coffin, covered with a German flag, was placed on a gun-carriage and drawn to the cemetery by a party of Royal Army Medical Corps men under the command of a sergeant. “We are fighting the Germans,” said the Bishop of Birmingham who read the service over the grave, “and we are determined to go on fighting until we have achieved our end, but enmity should cease at the graveside. The enemy dead should be treated with as much respect as we treat our own.” At the conclusion of the brief service the “Last Post” was sounded.
The grave is situated on the highest part of the cemetery, and is within a few yards of the ground set apart for the burial of our own men who have died in the Southern General Hospital. Hoftner is the first German prisoner of war to be buried in Birmingham.