Percy Gerrish was born on 22nd August 1890 in Bath, Somerset. The youngest of three children – all boys – his parents were Alfred and Charlotte Gerrish. Alfred was painter and decorator by trade but, by the time of the 1911 census, the family had moved to Batheaston, and he was employed as a school attendance officer.

Alfred and Charlotte had raised their children well: the same census recorded their oldest son, also called Alfred, was employed as a clerk; their middle son, Reginald, was a printer; Percy, then 20 years old, was working as a draughtsman for an engineering company,

War came to Britain’s shores in 1914, and while he did not join up at once, when the Military Service Act of 1916 came in, Percy found himself conscripted. He enlisted on 24th November 1916 and, while he noted a preference for the Royal Field Artillery or Royal Garrison Artillery, his previous employment made him ideal for work as a clerk in the Army Service Corps.

Private Gerrish’s time in the army was spent on home soil. Full details are not available, but he certainly served in camps around Codford, Wiltshire. This may have been how he met a young woman called Ada Cox, who lived in Bemerton, on the outskirts of Salisbury. On 21st July 1917, the couple married in the new Mrs Gerrish’s local church.

Percy’s army career went well, although during 1918 illness was to dog him. He spent a week in a hospital in Fovant, near Salisbury in June, suffering from influenza, before being readmitted for a month just a week later, having contracted pharyngitis – an inflammation of the pharynx.

By the late summer of 1918, Private Gerrish had been moved to Newport Pagnell, Buckinghamshire. His ongoing health conditions were still an issue, however, and on 23rd October he was admitted to the Tickford Abbey Auxiliary Hospital. He had contracted laryngitis by this point, but, as the weeks in hospital progressed, he was soon also bogged down by tuberculosis.

Sadly, this was to prove Percy’s undoing. He passed away on 27th December 1918, aged just 28 years old.

Percy Gerrish’s body was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the graveyard of St John the Baptist Church, in a plot next to his father, Alfred, who had died seven months before.

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