Page 79 - Who Was Sapper Brown
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According to ‘The Levantine Heritage’ website, the Braggiotti family was originally a noble Venetian
family that moved to Milan and then on to Chios by 1500.23 The family left Chios about 1800, with
branches moving to Smyrna (where the family had the largest cotton mills by 1893) and Constantinople.
One branch probably came from Smyrna to Cyprus in 1878, when many enterprising merchantmen
came over from there in the hope of finding profitable business among the newly arrived British troops.
The Braggiotti family coat of arms
First World War burials
Grave /
Name
Rank
Service Date of Death
Age
Regiment / Memorial
Number
Service
Reference
Cope, H
Foreman
30/08/1916
Civilian
63
Divers, Hugh
Private
28172
07/06/1916
Royal Scots
62
Docherty, James
Private
28710
22/08/1918
Royal Scots
64
The Troodos Cemetery First World War casualty records listed on the
CWGC website
Further examination of these three individual casualty records reveals that Privates Hugh Divers and
James Docherty had been members of the 1st Garrison Battalion Royal Scots, whose main task in
Cyprus was guarding some 1300 Turkish prisoners of war in Famagusta.
Ten of their colleagues are buried in Famagusta Military Cemetery, and one in Nicosia British Cemetery.
Further details of the battalion are given in the Famagusta section of this book. It is likely that Private
Docherty, who died in August 1918, died of influenza, as did many of his colleagues now buried in
Famagusta.
23 Levantine Heritage – the story of a community. www.levantineheritage.com/testi53.htm
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