Military History

Theatre of War	Medals	Commonwealth War Grave or Memorial
France and Flanders	1914 Star, British War & Victory Medals	Thiepval Memorial
Arrived in Theatre	Medal Citation (if app)	SWFHS Area Memorials
26 Oct 1914	~	Stretton on Dunsmore
Action, Battle or Other Reason Killed	Date and Place Mobilised	Other War Memorials
Battle of Delville Wood (Battle of the Somme)	September 1914 at Coventry
Place of Death	Previous Regiments or Units
near Ginchy	~

Circumstances Leading to Death (Normally from War Diary)           

Frederick is listed as being killed in action on 3 Sep 1916 during the Battle of Delville Wood. The Battalion war diary for that day is transcribed below.

In the Field - 2nd: The Battalion paraded at 10am and Marched to Pommiers Redoubt. At 8pm A&B Coys moved up to Montauban Alley and C&D coys moved to Folly Trench

In the Field - 3rd: At 7am on the 3rd A&B Coy moved up from Montauban Alley and took up their assembly positions with C&D Coys in Folly Trench. Bn HQ was moved forward from here and took up their position 150yds W of Waterlot Farm where they remained for the rest of the operations. While in assembly positions we suffered casualties from enemy's shell fire Killed 1 OR, Wounded 8 OR.

At the zero hour which was 12 noon the companies passed ? advancing very steadily in artillery formation towards their objective. The order of the Coys was A on the right, then B & C, D coy which was on the left hand to form a defensive flank facing N along Ale Alley. At 1.40pm a runner in from OC D Coy saying that he was held up by Machine Guns in Hop & Ale Alleys and was diggin in in front of them.

At 1.43pm a runner arrive from Lt D.W. Arnott who was now commanding B Coy, Catp Wasey having been wounded, stating that he had reached the objective and was digging in. The objectives of A, B & C  Coys was the Blue Line which they had to consolidate it was on running through the W end of Ginchy. All companies reached their objectives & dug in. A&B Coys in touch but we got no news from C. Coy. The 20th Manchester Regt were reported to be through the village.

At 4.21pm we got a verbal message that the troops were leaving the village when this was found to be true and the heavy and the heavy casualties we had suffered were known it was decided to relieve the Brigade.

At 11pm HQ was moved to Folly Trench and later back to Pommiers Redoubt and few men came in but the majority of them were still holding their original objective in Ginchy.

One detached group of C&D Coys under Capt H.P. Williams Freeman and 2/Lt R.E Willis hung on for 36 hours? after the Bde was relieved. Another detached group of A Coys under Lt J. S. Harrowin and 2/Lt H. Sulman hung on in the S end of Ginchy for 3 days after the Brigade had been relieved being unable to get any communication. This was of great value to the position of the troops in Guillemont.

The casualites during the period were rather heavy (320):
Officers (all named): 2 Killed, 1 died of wounds, 6 wounded and 2 missing believed wounded.
Other Ranks: 26 killed, 7 died of wounds, 197 wounded and 90 missing.  END