Additional reporting by Steve Loader

As Judith Holloway visited her father’s grave, her eyes were drawn to the nearby headstone for a fallen soldier - his mortal remains laid to rest a long way from home.

It would spark a remarkable voyage of discovery which would span across the Atlantic, creating a remarkable bond between the young soldier’s surviving relations and a town in Kent.

As she stood in Bybrook Cemetery in Ashford, she became intrigued by the grave of 26-year-old Gunner Walter Pike. He was from Newfoundland - Canada’s most easterly province.

It is the land closest to the wreck of the Titanic - lying in the deep some 400 miles off its Atlantic coast.

Originally from the province’s capital of St John’s, the fact he was interred some 2,300 miles away from his family tugged on Mrs Holloway’s heartstrings. So she started looking into his life and times.

His cause of death was even more tragic.

She found out that Gnr Pike died on October 1, 1941, in a road accident while his 59th Heavy Regiment of the Royal Artillery was billeted at Ashford School – the private, then girls-only, institution in East Hill which at that stage had been requisitioned for wartime service.

He had been a pedestrian when he was hit by a car.

Mrs Holloway said: “I wrote to the local paper in St John’s saying although he was so far from home, Walter was not forgotten and, through that, I was put in touch with his family and his remaining brother Frank, 89.

“He was just 12 when Walter died and due to wartime security was told only that his brother died somewhere in England. He was overcome to hear that I had been visiting Walter and paying my respects to him.

“In May 2019, I visited St John's and met with Walter's family and on my return, I was invited to come and talk to the school about its connection with Newfoundland.

“In 2022, I then had the pleasure of welcoming Frank’s daughter Vicki and her husband and daughter to Ashford, to show them where Walter had served when billeted at Ashford School.”

Mrs Holloway’s key contact at the school has been the chaplain, the Rev Richard Bellamy, who was also touched by Gnr Pike and his comrades’ story and instigated a Remembrance Service for the 59th Regiment RA at St Mary’s Church, Ashford in November 2019.

The Rev Bellamy recalled how this ignited Ashford School pupils’ interest in the 59th Regiment RA connection.

He explained: “During the service, a book called More Fighting Newfoundlanders was donated to us from Walter's brother Frank. Written by a Canadian artillery officer this book includes reports of the 59th’s exploits – after a relatively quiet time before D-Day, they were soon in the thick of it – and it became a great resource for pupils.”

Ashford School head Michael Hall said the whole school was now aware of Gnr Pike and his regiment and added: “Walter's younger brother Frank wrote to me expressing the comfort that has come to him and the wider family through learning that Walter has not been forgotten.”

A recent ceremony at Ashford School unveiled a memorial to all members of the 59th Heavy Regiment RA based there during the war who served and gave their lives during the war.

It was attended by many VIPs and members of the UK and Canadian armed forces.

A special guest at this event was another Ashford resident who has done much to recognise the area’s long-distance links with Newfoundland.

Aldington villager David Hughes, 81, whose quest to erect a war memorial for the 50 war dead of the Ashford villages of Aldington, Bonnington and Hurst started in 1950 when, aged seven, he realised that local church plaques had omitted many names of the fallen.

Mr Hughes, who co-authored The Kent War Memorial Transcription Project, said: “It was wrong that Aldington and the local area didn’t have a memorial and the Newfoundlanders, who had some gunners based in our village, also had nothing marking how they came thousands of miles to make sacrifices in our defence.”

Masterminding a determined fund-raising campaign, Mr Hughes’ dream was finally realised in July 2016 when a 9ft-high war memorial was unveiled, built from ragstone – a building material for which Aldington was once famous.

Next to this monument is a ragstone bench commemorating the Newfoundlanders of the 59th Regiment RA.

The regiment arrived in England in June 1940 as the Battle of Britain began and will have witnessed dogfights over the south east and shared in the real fear of Nazi invasion among the whole population.

The Newfoundlanders then gained a long-term base at Ashford School the following June, plus orders to fight to the last, using their heavy guns to defend the Kent coastline from Hythe to the western edge of Romney Marsh.

The war diary of the 59th’s commander, Lt Col J W Nelson, noted: “The [school] premises are particularly suitable for military occupation, though it is not possible to accommodate heavy vehicles. The latter are in the main wagon lines at Charing.”

A period of intense training followed and then re-arming with formidable 7.2-inch howitzers and 155mm guns, dubbed 'Long Toms' by the Americans, to follow up the D-Day landings of June 1944.

They fought many notable battles across northwest Europe, finishing in Hamburg, Germany when the war in Europe ended in May 1945.

Honours awarded to the regiment’s soldiers included the Military Cross, British Empire Medal, Distinguished Service Order, and Croix-de-Guerre, but at the cost of 87 men.