GRATEFUL representatives from the Sicilian town of Piedemonte Etneo were amongst those who attended a special service to rededicate the grave of Fusilier Edward Graham last week.

Fusilier Graham's son, who is also called Edward, made national headlines after successfully tracing the final resting place of the father he and his twin brother never met.

Edward, who lives in Prudhoe, said: "This was for me the end of a very long and at times frustrating journey and the occasion came with very mixed emotions.

"On one hand, there was great satisfaction in having located my father’s resting place but, of course, this was tinged with sadness that I never had the opportunity to meet him or, indeed, did he have the chance to get to know his children.

"There is, however, a degree of comfort that I have been able, with great assistance from some wonderful people, to find and identify my father’s grave and to see him laid in a beautiful setting, alongside the comrades who fought so bravely beside him.”

In an emotionally charged service, Edward and his brother, Sydney, from Cramlington were able to pay their respect as their father's grave was re-dedicated with full military honours.

The service was attended by a strong contingent of former members of Fusilier Graham's regiment, the Royal Irish, and people from the Sicilian town which fusilier Graham had taken part in liberating just the day before he was killed on August 13, 1943.

The grave of Fusilier Graham was previously marked by a headstone bearing the inscription 'Unknown Soldier', but this has now been replaced with a new stone of Italian marble inscribed with Fusilier Graham’s name and service number.

The service in the Catania War Cemetery in Sicily was conducted by Padre Ivan Linton, chaplain to the Royal Irish Regiment, who also provided the guard of honour. At the conclusion of the service the regimental bugler sounded the 'Last Post' whilst a piper played a haunting Irish lament.

Edward was presented with the Union Flag, normally used to cover the coffin at military funerals. Wreaths were laid at the Cross of Sacrifice by Edward, his brother Sydney, the Ministry of Defence Attache to Italy and representatives of the Irish Brigade and the town council of Piedemonte Etneo.

Edward added that the occasion was organised with "great care and sensitivity" by Nicola Nash of the Ministry of Defence’s Joint Casualty and Compassionate Centre.

Fusilier Graham, who hailed from Chopwell, Gateshead but met his wife, Eveline, whilst stationed in Ireland, was killed when his boys were only 22 days old and Edward believes he probably never knew they'd been born. The headstone bears their name, that of their mother and that of the couple's first-born son, John Joseph, who tragically died in infancy.

The family had always known that Edward had died during the Allies' advance through Sicily at the start of the Italian campaign but they didn't know exactly where his body lay.

After a lifetime's research, Edward's breakthrough came on a visit to the Royal Irish Fusiliers Museum in Armagh where the battalion's war diary enabled him to pinpoint exactly when and where his father fell.