Solving the Picardy Puzzle

Question

Every so often, someone dies in Picardy.  This is not surprising or unusual, except that it is the oddest people who have never been to Picardy in their lives who suddenly go to Picardy to die.

Here in someone's genealogy is an example, but it's only the most recent one.  Why would this person go to Y, Somme, Picardie, France, to die?  And what is the "Y" about?

It occurs to me that in some earlier iteration of this genealogy there was a question:  "Death -- Y or N".  And the person selected Y.  Yes he is dead.  And then I'll bet there was a gedcom program of some kind that thought Y was a place, and found one.  Consistently.  

And so we have people from Idaho and England and Russia and Australia, all who at the close of their lives went to Picardy to die.

What do you think?  Am I wrong?

Added Note:  Thanks, Eve.  And here's the blog article that is quoted that even has a photo of the sign that one is entering "Y" in Picardie, France!  

Comments

Y my favourite sounding French letter ee-grek , it has always amused me!

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If all of your ancestors came from there, you have 100% Y DNA. 

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oooh, oooh, oooh!

Answer 1

For some reason these do not come up among the previous questions:

https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/20328/awake-thinking-about-somme-picardie-france-haunted-place-earth

https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/252584/how-come-these-swedes-were-born-in-y-somme-picardie-france?show=252584#q252584

https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/349236/why-somme-picardie-france-is-probably-bogus-death-location?show=349236#q349236

Answer 2

I would assume that 'Y' stands for Ypres, which was in the Picardie area of Northern France. The battles there are most commonly grouped as the Somme.

Comments

Actually, Dave, it turns out there really is a place "Y" -- click on the word "sign" at the bottom of my note and curser down and you'll see a photo of the sign in Picardie welcoming you to "Y".

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Thanks Jack.

Answer 3

Those auto-complete protocols in early genealogy software gave people biographies some amazingly diverse geography.

The people from all over the world who went to "Y, Somme, Picardie, France" to die may also have had life events in "Holland, Reusel, Reusel-de Mierden, Noord-Brabant. Netherlands," "Church, Wetzel, West Virginia" (that's probably a marriage place), "U, Cocle, Panama," or "Colony, Laurel, Kentucky." Other popular death locations are "Sea, Manado, Sulawesi Utara, Indonesia",  "Young, Texas, United States" and "Age, Cuanza Sul, Angola."