On a morning run around the neighbourhood, I took a short cut through a leafy cemetery, and between catching my breath and having some water and being ever the nosy history teacher I started to read some of the lichen clad stones.

A that moment my Dad called me and I mentioned how beautiful the cemetery was and to my surprise he told me that my great grandfather was buried somewhere in that exact same place. I stopped on a bench and grabbed another drink as my Dad proceeded to tell me the story of my Great Grandfather Edward Walker, who had been a soldier in WW1.

Edward had been in the Royal Artillery division where he and his team of horses would lug huge guns into position to fire at the enemy, as anyone who has studied History or seen the movie/play Warhorse knows, this was pretty much the last time that horses were used in such combat. The invention of automatic weapons and advancements in vehicle adaptability, put paid to the faithful steeds’ careers. For my grandad, him and his team were working on the front, under only imaginable conditions.

During a charge to gain ground at The Battle of Ypres, his cannon and horses were hit with a shell.

Edward survived the initial impact but was pinned down under a dead horse for nearly three days in “No mans land”. Miraculously he survived by drinking rainwater and nursing a crushed pelvis amongst other injuries. He was discovered by other Allied forces and rescued and returned home to London to recover.

According to my father, my great grandad rarely spoke about the war, like many of his peers that had also experienced the battlefields. The pain of reliving the moment of history that defined the world to come for generations after, came at such a personal and collective loss for so many.

This story got me thinking. Had my father not told me about Edwards heroics, then that story would be lost to time when he passes.

Just a few short words on his gravestone.

Where are these moments or stories preserved? How many great biographies have been lost to time? It also got me contemplating something someone once mentioned to me: “Everyone’s gravestone goes unattended within two generations!”

I eventually found my great grandfathers grave where he was buried alongside his wife Florence, who worked in munitions factories at the same time her husband was fighting overseas, all whilst raising my Nan, Irene Walker. She and many other women during that period, were heroes also, albeit in a distinctly different role to her husband.

So, pondering my Great Grandfathers heroics and trying to locate his final resting place, I thought more about the memorials that we leave for people.

From gravestones, to benches, to planted trees, they all had certain things in common. What the persons name was, when they were born, when they passed and whom they left behind. A quote about life or a religious verse that resonated to the faith of the deceased.

These scratch but the surface of their life lived. We live in an age of information but so much is lost to the ether when someones life comes to an end.

So Timeless Tribute was born; a way to preserve the stories for those that have left us. It is a way to inform anyone of the loved one that is no longer here, what they did and whose life they touched.

Those closest curate the memories using words and pictures and leave links to any other media that captures their essence.

Through your unique QR code, we are transported to a personal Timeless Tribute.

If they were important in life then they should be remembered in death.

John- Co-founder of Timeless Tribute