William Reginald Hunt was born in the Somerset village of Butcombe on 14th September 1900. The youngest of six children, his parents were farmers Walter and Bertha Hunt.

Little information about William – who was known in the family as Reggie – is available. He was still at school at the time of the 1911 census and enlisted in the army in the summer of 1918. His service papers no longer exist, and his life in between these points is lost to time.

Private Hunt joined the Devonshire Regiment, and was attached to the 53rd (Young Soldier) Battalion. He was based at Rolleston Camp in Wiltshire and, while billeted there, in the cramped and overcrowded conditions of the army barracks, he contracted pneumonia.

William was admitted to the camp’s hospital, but the condition was to prove too much. He passed away on 23rd November 1918, aged just eighteen years old.

The body of William Reginald Hunt was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the graveyard of St Michael’s Church, in his home village of Butcombe.

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