A synopsis of the most recent projects I have completed:
September 2024
Born in Londonderry in 1889, Thomas Carlin joined the Militia of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers in 1906 and served until it was disbanded in the army reforms of 1908. He re-enlisted, by then a married man with children, in September 1914 and served successively with the regiment’s 5th, 7th and 1st Battalions. Thomas went to Gallipoli with the 5th and was wounded at Suvla Bay and then at Kosturino in Salonika. With the 7th, he was hit again in the attack on Beck House and Delva Farm in August 1917. And on 22 March 1917 he was captured at Fontaine-les-Clercs while serving with 1st Battalion. Thomas was held at Langensalza and Merseburg POW camps.
August 2024
South Shields man Henry Smith, a married river boatman born in 1881, attested in the Group System in December 1915 and was called up to the 5th Durham Light Infantry in April 1917. After training at Ripon, he went to France with a draft and served thereafter with the 20th Battalion, also known as the Wearside Battalion. He survived actions in the Third Battle of Ypres; went briefly to Italy; and then went through the German offensive of March 1918. Taking part in the successful Final Advance in Flanders, he suffered a minor wound to his hand when attacking near Menin on 14 October 1918.
August 2024
From Helpringham in Lincolnshire and born in 1891, John Norman Skerritt was conscripted under the 1916 Military Service Act and called up for service with the Army Veterinary Corps in January 1917. He went to France soon after. On 21 March 1918, with many others of the AVC, he was transferred to the infantry and trained and went on to serve with the 11th Royal Fusiliers. He transferred to the 1/6th Seaforth Highlanders on 1 September 1918 and participated in the final actions on the River Selle. John died of an illness in Sleaford on 16 February 1919 and is buried in the churchyard of his village.
August 2024
Andrew Reid, who grew up on various farms in Ross-shire, joined G Squadron 2nd Lovat’s Scouts when just under 18 years of age in March 1914. He served with it through the Gallipoli and Salonika campaigns, and was with it when it became the 10th Battalion of the Cameron Highlanders. Andrew also went with it to France in 1918, and came through the war only having suffered two periods of illness. He went on to a career in the police in Stirlingshire.
August 2024
Durham, later Newcastle, man Edward Green, born in 1875, had three periods of service with the Northumberland Fusiliers. A regular soldier 1899-1910 during which he deserted for two years but was exonerated; a Special Reservist 1914-15 discharged on medical grounds; and again 1915 until his death by shellfire in trenches at Beaucourt-sur-l’Ancre on 5 January 1917. He served with 8th Battalion at Gallipoli, Egypt and in France. Edward has no known grave and sadly the date of his death was incorrectly printed in the register of the Thiepval Memorial.
August 2024
William Joseph Hooper, born in 1892 and living in Wandsworth, joined his local 7th Battalion of the Essex Regiment on 30 November 1914. He went with it to Gallipoli, landing at Suvla Bay on 11 August 1915, and continued until he was seriously wounded at the First Battle of Gaza on 26-27 March 1917. William was discharged on medical grounds in November 1917. A boot and shoe repairer by trade, he married in 1919, moved to Surrey and built a family of four children. He died young, in 1928.
August 2024
1897-born West Hampstead man Frederick London joined the Honourable Artillery Company (Infantry) on 25 February 1916. He went to France with “D” Company of 2nd Battalion on 3 October 1916 and remained until wounded when patrolling towards Bucquoy on 15 March 1917. Frederick returned to France as a Royal Engineer on 13 April 1918 and was posted to the Canadian 5th Railway Survey and Reconnaissance Section.
August 2024
Joining the 11th (Service) Battalion of the Royal Scots in October 1914, William Harry Grant served with it in France until he was fatally wounded at Snag Trench near Eaucourt l’Abbaye during the Battle of the Somme in October 1916. He had previously been wounded in September 1915 at the Hohenzollern Redoubt near Loos. William was taken in by the Germans and succumbed to his wounds in the hospital at the Lycée Henri Wallon in Valenciennes. A curiosity is that he had followed his father in being a gamekeeper at Fyvie in Aberdeenshire, but was a musician when he enlisted and was made a Drummer.
July 2024
William Ting, originally from Southwark but by 1914 living in Islington, joined the Royal Fusiliers in October 1914. Apart from a break of two months in mid-1917, he served with its 13th (Service) Battalion throughout the war. He earned the Military Medal during the 1917 Battle of Arras, but sadly (and typically) the exact circumstances are no longer documented.
July 2024
Charles Bratley was 20 when he was called up from the Group System to train with 2/7th Northumberland Fusiliers in March 1916. From a farming family living in villages near Grimsby, he became a bricklayer after the war. He went to France with a large draft of men in early July 1916 and was transferred to the 1/7th Duke of Wellington’s (West Riding Regiment). Charles became a casualty on three occasions: gassed at Nieuwpoort in 1917 and wounded near Naves in France in the pursuit to the Selle in October 1918, neither seriously. He was also reported to be suffering from shell-shock but February 1917 but this also appears short-lived.
July 2024
South Shields man William Green attested in the Group System just before it closed and conscription was introduced in 1916. He was not yet 18. When he was called up in February 1917 he was given a very low medical rating which meant he would not serve overseas. He became a Driver with 556 and later 555 (Horse Transport) Companies of the Army Service Corps, based at Thoresby Camp, Doncaster and later at Clipstone Camp. He suffered a nasty accident when his horses bolted when he was calling at Rutland House Hospital in late 1917 and his wagon ran over him, but he was soon back to duty and remained so until late in 1919. He married in Doncaster in June 1918.
July 2024
John Bishop, a farmer from Treborough near Minehead. He served in the West Somerset Yeomanry from 1910 until 1916 when he was discharged as “time expired”. John attended all of the pre-war summer training camps and was embodied when war began. Not having agreed to the “Imperial Service Obligation”, he was transferred to the Yeomanry Squadron of the 8th Provisional Brigade at Newcastle when his own regiment departed for Gallipoli in 1915. He was conscripted in February 1917, this time serving with the Royal Horse Artillery. John spent the rest of his war with M Battery RHA in India.
July 2024
Born in Dublin in 1896, Ernest O’Beirne was a clerk at the War Office in London when he attested in the Group System in February 1916. Called up just under a year later, he trained with the 2/1st Northern Cyclist Battalion at Skegness before being transferred to the Royal Naval Division and training at Blandford. He went to France and joined Hood Battalion with a draft in late August 1917. Ernest survived the awful Second Battle of Passchendaele but was killed in action on 30 December 1917 in the Action of Welsh Ridge, north of La Vacquerie near Cambrai. He has no known grave but there are ground for believing he may lie in Fifteen Ravine British Cemetery, marked as an unknown soldier.
July 2024
Glasgow-born coal miner Peter Haggerty joined the Seaforth Highlanders on 1 September 1914 and went to France with 8th (Service) Battalion the following July. He was seriously wounded on the Frezenberg ridge when the battalion attacked at the start of the Third Battle of Ypres on 31 July 1917: his luck ran out, for he had come through Loos, the Somme, and Arras. He returned to duty in May 1918 with 7th (Service) Battalion but was fatally wounded on 22 August 1918 when his unit was providing working parties in the rear area between Flêtre and Méteren in French Flanders. He was buried in Caëstre Military Cemetery. Peter was unmarried and aged 25.
July 2024
Leeds man Leonard Newton, born in 1897 and a resident there for the rest of his life, enlisted in July 1915, choosing to join the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry. He went to France with a draft for the 7th (Service) Battalion and joined it near Fleurbaix in France on 27 December 1915. Leonard was wounded in the first few days of August 1916, when the battalion was holding trenches near Serre, a German-held village on the Somme battlefield: the battalion’s position, ironically, was just yards from where the “Leeds Pals” had suffered heavy casualties on 1 July 1916. Leonard eventually returned to the battalion, but when it was disbanded in February 1918 spent some time with 14th Entrenching Battalion before being transferred to the Rifle Brigade and its 13th (Service) Battalion in May 1918. He survived several of the major battles of the “Hundred Days Offensive”.
July 2024
Charles Smith Hewis, born in Lincoln in 1896. A broken femur, which happened when he stepped awkwardly off a pavement in 1911, did not affect his military service. He enlisted in early June 1915 and served for the next three years with the 2/1st Lincolnshire Yeomanry. For much of that time it was in North Norfolk, but for a short while it was in Hertfordshire, where he met his future wife. They married in June 1918. The regiment was eventually converted into a cyclist unit. Charles went to France with a large draft from his regiment and was transferred to the Essex Regiment in late August 1918. He then served with the 10th (Service) Battalion and went through the Battles of the Hindenburg Line, and the Battles of the Selle and the Sambre, without coming to harm.
July 2024
From March in Cambridgeshire but living in Bradford when he enlisted in August 1914, Walter Portwood joined the West Yorkshire Regiment. He married during a leave period in his training and eventually went to Gallipoli and the 9th (Service) Battalion with a draft in early October 1915. His time with the battalion was short, for he was in hospital in Malta by the end of that month, receiving treatment for dysentery. After a return home and more training, he went to the 10th (Service) Battalion in France in February 1917. Walter suffered a wound to his thigh on 23 April 1917 in the attack on Bayonet Trench during the Battle of Arras. He was again returned home but returned to the battalion in mid-August 1917. Walter survived the latter phases of the Third Battle of Ypres and the fight against German offensive Operation “Michael” in late March 1918. Identified as a potential officer, he was returned home in June 1918 and went to 23rd Officer Cadet Battalion in the August. His commission as a Second Lieutenant came through after hostilities had ended and he was never employed as an officer. Walter, his wife, and son, who had been born on the day that Operation “Michael” began, emigrated to Canada in 1927.
July 2024
Belfast man James Rooney, born in 1886, joined the Royal Garrison Artillery in December 1903. He spent his overseas service at Malta before being transferred to reserve in December 1906. James was mobilised in August 1914, by now a married man with two daughters, and went to France in October 1915. Serving with 4th Siege Battery, he eventually became a Bombardier. Gassed near Beuvry in early June 1918, he soon returned to duty, only to be killed near Taintignies on 28 October 1918 when his battery was supporting the advance of 16th Division. He lies in a military plot in the communal cemetery there.
July 2024
Vernon John Carroll, born in West Bromwich in 1879, joined the Worcestershire Regiment as a regular in 1900 after a period in the Militia of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment. He served in South Africa during the latter part of the Boer War, having been posted to the Worcestershire Company of the 17th Mounted Infantry. He spent the rest of his colour service in India and Ceylon. While on reserve, which he extended by four years, he married and had a daughter. Recalled in August 1914, he was eventually posted to the 4th Battalion and went with it to Gallipoli. Vernon was severely wounded in the abdomen by shrapnel in the battalion’s day of tragedy, an attack on 6 August 1915 which was only survived by twelve men. He was discharged on medical grounds in May 1916. After he died unexpectedly in October 1939, the inquest found that his shrapnel wound was a major contributor.
July 2024
Albert Lees, born in Salford in 1894, was married and had a young daughter when he attested for the Group System in late 1915. Called up to the Lancashire Fusiliers in April 1916, he trained with the 3rd (Reserve) Battalion before going to France. Albert’s draft joined the 10th (Service) Battalion just as it was going into its first action in the Battle of the Somme in July 1916. He survived that battle and an attack near Greenland Hill in early May 1917 during the Battle of Arras, but received a fatal wound in an attack in the same area on 16 May 1917. He died at a Casualty Clearing Station near Duisans.
June 2024
Samuel James Allen was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1886, but later moved to South London with his widowed mother and elder brother. In 1906 he got a job as a railway fireman. He enlisted on 14 August 1914 and went to France with the 8th Royal Fusiliers. After surviving the Battle of Loos, he became shell-shocked during his battalion’s attack on “The Chord” in early March 1916. After medical attention at hospitals in Wiltshire, he went back to France in late July 1916, posted to his regiment’s 20th Battalion. A month later, he suffered a severe wound to his arm near High Wood in the Battle of the Somme. Eighteen months of hospital treatment followed, before a transfer to the Army Service Corps and periods at Park Royal and Tunbridge Wells. He married during this period and was discharged on medical grounds at the end of October 1918. Samuel soon became London tram driver, a job he then held for many years.
June 2024
Timothy Higgins, an only child from Grimsby, whose father died in April 1911. Later that year, aged just 14, Tim saved a man’s life when he rescued him from drowning in the Royal Dock. He was handsomely rewarded for it by financial donations,and was presented with the Royal Humane Society Medal in bronze. Tim joined the 2nd Lincolnshire Battery RFA TF in late 1913 and went to France with it in March 1915. In May 1917 he transferred to the 46th Divisional Signal Company and served until affected by poison gas near La Baraque on 4 October 1918. He later returned to duty, posted to the 29th Divisional Signal Company with the Army of Occupation in Germany. Tim re-enlisted after the war, seeing service with the Defence Force and Territorial Army in 1921-1922.
June 2024
Robert Reynolds, who came from Scarisbrick near Ormskirk in Lancashire. Enlisted into the Army Veterinary Corps (Territorial Force) in August 1915, joining a section of a veterinary hospital based at Scarisbrick Hall. When it formed the 1/1st East Lancashire Mobile Veterinary Section, he was posted into that unit and went with it to France in March 1917. In January 1918 he was compulsorily transferred for service as an infantryman, and after conversion training he joined 7th Royal Fusiliers in early March 1918. After just four days, he was seriously wounded by shellfire in front of Havrincourt Wood near Cambrai. Rbert was evacuated home for lengthy medical treatment and was eventually discharged in medical grounds. Despite his injuries he later became a policeman in Liverpool and worked as such for many years.
June 2024
Exeter man James Pilling Cundy. Joined regular army in 1900 and served in Army Service Corps. Transferred to reserve in 1903. Recalled for war service, he was among the first to go to France in August 1914. Served throughout with 35th (Horse Transport) Company, the headquarters company of 2nd Divisional Train. He was discharged in 1920. In 1942, he earned the British Empire Medal for his bravery in saving twelve horses from a blazing stables, hit by an incendiary bomb during a “Baedecker” air raid on his home town. He died in 1946.