George Watts was born in the autumn of 1892, one of ten children to James and Caroline. The family were raised in Ottery St Mary, Devon, but by the time of the 1911 census, they had moved to Williton, Somerset, where James was running the Railway Hotel. At this point George is noted as being a grocer’s assistant.

Little further information is available for George. He courted a Withycombe farm labourer’s daughter called Ellen Gould, and the couple had a son together in 1917, but there is no evidence that the couple got married.

When war broke out, George stepped up to play his part. He listed in the Somerset Light Infantry and, while his service record has been lost to time, other evidence confirms that he had joined the 2nd/5th Battalion long before the conflict finished. Private Watts’ troop spent the conflict in India, although there is no evidence that he left Britain’s shores.

The next record for George shows that he was admitted to a military hospital in Devonport, Devon, suffering from nephritis, a form of kidney disease. Sadly, he was to succumb to the condition, and passed away on 22nd November 1919, at the age of 27 years old.

George Watts was taken back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the peaceful graveyard of St Decuman’s Church in Watchet, not far from where his family still lived.

---