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Perth Academy pupils’ film reveals stories behind the names on school’s Second World War memorial

Head girl Jess Short peruses some of the names on the war memorial with (from left) Sophie Evans, Charlotte Fraser, Hanna Braithwaite, Nuala Maclennan, Rory Dent and Olivia Dewar. Pictures by Kenny Smith/ DCT Media
Head girl Jess Short peruses some of the names on the war memorial with (from left) Sophie Evans, Charlotte Fraser, Hanna Braithwaite, Nuala Maclennan, Rory Dent and Olivia Dewar. Pictures by Kenny Smith/ DCT Media

Generations of Perth Academy pupils will be familiar with the war memorial in the school’s assembly hall – but may know little of the people behind the names listed.

Now the stories of some of the former pupils who strode that same hall and sat in the same classrooms before their lives were cut short in the Second World War have been told in a film made decades on by some of today’s pupils.

Professional golfer William Laidlaw, killed in Bremen aged 27, and Corporal Helen Grassie, who died aged 24 in the Bourne End rail crash, are just two of the 79 academy alumni honoured in Perth Academy Remembers.

Pupils interviewed descendants of some of the fallen and learned their relatives’ fascinating and tragic stories for the project, which follows earlier research into the school’s First World War fallen.

We spoke to some of the seven pupils who made the hour-long documentary with retired teacher David Dykes and teachers Douglas Findlay and Stuart Digney to find out how the project had changed how they view the school memorial.

Watch: Perth Academy Remembers trailer

The pupils’ experience

Charlotte Fraser, in S5, is proud to have helped make the film and said she felt like she knew the former pupils.

She said: “It’s not just like looking at names anymore, it’s getting to know them as people, and their sacrifices.”

It was “heart-warming”, she said, to speak to relatives.

“Some of them had loads of stories they haven’t had the opportunity to tell and now they can be told.”

S6 pupil Jess Short said: “We’ve read their names on the wall, but to know their background you understand more and feel closer to them; you know what happened and what the experience was like for them.”

It was eye-opening to see how Perth Academy really played a massive part in the war.”

Rory Dent

Fellow S6 pupil Rory Dent said the project had changed how he feels about the school’s war memorial.

“I look at it in a different way now; we have that connection that we didn’t have before.

“It was quite eye-opening to see how Perth Academy really played a massive part in the war.”

The youngest group member, Nuala Maclennan, S2, said making the film was a profound lesson about the sacrifices made by fellow pupils during the Second World War.

She said: “We learned information you would never have got in history [class].

“Hopefully people will see how important it is we remember them.”

Project co-ordinator and former teacher Dave Dykes with head girl Jess Short and (from left) Sophie Evans, Nuala Maclennan, Charlotte Fraser, head teacher Eleanor Paul, teacher and video editor Stewart Digney, Rory Dent, Olivia Dewar and Hanna Braithwaite.

Perth Academy Remembers was funded by grants from the Gannochy Trust and Culture Perth and Kinross and launched at St Matthew’s Church, Perth, on Friday.

It follows work Mr Dykes led earlier with the school’s Flowers of the Forest group researching the 168 former pupils and staff killed in the First World War.

Head teacher Eleanor Paul said: “It is inspirational how those who lead the project manage to bring the past to life through the vivid storytelling of former pupils of Perth Academy – pupils who sat in the same classrooms as the young people who attend the school today.

“It is extremely important work which helps young people today to relate to the sacrifices and achievements of those who lost their lives in the world wars.”

Some of the fallen in Perth Academy Remembers

William Laidlaw: A professional golfer who came seventh in the 1937 Open Championship at Carnoustie, killed in an RAF raid over Bremen in October 1941.

James ‘Jimmy’ Carr: An apprentice deck officer lost when his ship was torpedoed by a U-boat after it left Halifax for the UK.

Helen Grassie: A corporal in the Auxiliary Territorial Service she was killed in the Bourne End rail crash a month after the war ended, as she travelled home for leave.

Robert Campbell: Died in February 1942 when the Royal Navy patrol vessel he was aboard was bombed.

Watch the full documentary: Perth Academy Remembers

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