Harold William Vernon was born on 23rd March 1896. The older of two children, his parents were John and Julia Smith. Harold’s early life is a bit of a mystery: the 1901 census found him living with mother, who was running their newsagent and tobacconist on Wilberforce Road, in their home town of Leicester, Leicestershire. John is absent from the census, and Julia died in 1908. On the following census return, taken in 1911, all of the remaining members of the Vernon family are noticeable only by their absence.

In January 1913, Harold joined the Royal Navy. He had been working as a turner by this point, but a life on the oceans seemed too good an adventure to pass up. Und the age to formally enlist, he was given the rank of Boy 2nd Class, and sent to HMS Vivid, the Royal Naval Dockyard, for his training.

Boy Vernon must have shown promise, because he was promoted to Boy 1st Class just four months after enlisting. He was assigned to the battleship HMS Prince of Wales in May 1913, and transferred to HMS Bulwark, another battleship, that autumn. In March 1914, Harold came of age, and was formally inducted into the Royal Navy. His service papers show that he was 5ft 3ins (1.6m) tall, with light brown hair, brown eyes and a fresh complexion. He was also recorded as having a scar on the middle of his right arm, a large mole above his navel and two further moles on either side of his neck.

When war broke out, Bulwark was assigned to the Channel Fleet, whose task was to protect Britain’s southern shores. On 26th November 1914, she was moored in the River Medway, close to Sheerness, and was being reloaded with ammunition. Deep in the ship’s stores, a nu,ber of the charges overheated and detonated, causing a chain reaction in the bowels of the battleship. The resulting explosion ripped through the battleship, and more than 740 crew were killed. Ordinary Seaman Vernon amongst them: he was just 18 years of age.

A mass funeral was held in the Woodlands Cemetery, Gillingham, Kent, not far from the dockyard in Chatham. Harold William Vernon was laid to rest in a marked grave, a burial not afforded to the those unfortunate individuals whose bodies had not been identified.

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