MEMBERS of a local history group have been researching a Forest link with the Battle of Waterloo.

Among the memorials in graveyard at Tidenham parish church is one to a soldier who saw action at the famous battle.

Last Thursday (June 18) saw the 200th anniversary of the battle near Brussels in Belgium which finally ended Napoleon's dreams of ruling Europe.

Among the 25,000 British soldiers under the command of the Duke of Wellington was Captain Thomas Charles Fenton who later settled with his second wife in Tidenham.

Members of the Tidenham Historical Group have been researching this fascinating link with the parish.

Capt Fenton was born in 1790 and joined the Dragoons at the age of 14 at the rank of Cornet.

He served in Spain and Portugal during the Peninsular War and later transferred to the 2nd Dragoons, or Scots Greys, and commanded troops at Waterloo.

He married Harriet Rooke in 1817 and lived at Mathern, near Chepstow, retiring from the army two years later.

They had at least one daughter, Fanny, and one son, Charles Hamilton Fenton, who was baptised at Tidenham in 1827, a year before his mother died.

In August 1830, Capt Fenton married Anne Kensington, the daughter of Anne Seys of Tutshill House – which is now St John's School and they lived at Stroat House which still stands at the side of the A48.

It is said that he used his prize money from the battle of Waterloo to add the facade to the front of the house.

Fenton died at the house in February 1841 and his daughter Ellen was born ten days after his death.

The memorial stone to Capt Fenton stands against the wall in the graveyard of the parish church of St Mary and St Peter.

The history of the church and other places of worship in the parish is contained in a book published by the group, The Churches and Chapels of the Parish of Tidenham. More

information is available by e-mailing [email protected]">[email protected] or by calling 01291 623736. Copies will also be available at Tidenham church at a fundraising event held by Friends of Tidenham Church on Saturday, July 4.