Category Archives: illness

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, illness, injury, Lincolnshire Regiment, photography, Private, Royal Lancashire Regiment, Somerset, story, Surrey, war

Private Arthur Rousell

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Private Arthur Rousell

Arthur Edward Rousell was born in the summer of 1898, one of five children to Henry and Lucy Rousell. Henry was a police constable in Worle, near Weston-super-Mare, and this is where he initially raised his family. By the time of the 1911 census – when Arthur was a schoolboy of 12 years old – the family had moved to the village of Huish Episcopi, on the outskirts of Langport.

Details of Arthur’s military career are sketchy. Initially enlisting with the Royal Lancashire Regiment, he was soon transferred over to the 1st Battalion of the Lincolnshire Regiment. He certainly saw action abroad, and was caught up on the Western Front.

Private Rousell was injured on 27th May 1918, this the first day of the Battle of Aisne. His battalion was certainly involved in the battle, but whether this was where he was injured, and what his injuries actually were, cannot be confirmed.

Evacuated back to England for treatment, Private Rousell was admitted to the South African Hospital in Richmond. Whether he was there for a long time, is not recorded, but he was certainly there in nine months after he was wounded.

It seems that his injuries left him susceptible; his pension record confirms that he died of sickness, and it seems likely that this was one of the lung conditions – pneumonia, influenza – that was prevalent following the cessation of hostilities.

Private Arthur Edward Rousell died on 22nd February 1919, at the age of 20 years old. His body was brought back to Huish Episcopi, and he lies at rest in the family grave in the graveyard of St Mary’s Church.

UPDATE : 19th April 2022

An article on Arthur’s passing sheds more light onto his life:

We regret to record the death of Pte. AE Rousell, of the 1st Lancs. Regt., eldest son of PC and Mrs HJ Rousell of Newtown, which occurred at Richmond Hospital on Saturday morning. Deceased, who was 20 years of age, had been seriously ill a week with influenza, death being due to septic pneumonia, which followed.

The late Pte. Rousell, was a member of the staff of “The Langport and Somerton Herald” where he served his apprenticeship, when war broke out, and joined up early in 1917, his regiment being the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry. After a period of training he proceeded to the front and took part in several engagements. He was gassed, and in the winter of that year was invalided home with trench feet. On recovery he was transferred to the Lancs. Regt., and again proceeded to the front.

On May 27th last he was severely wounded in the right leg by shrapnel, the bones being badly splintered. He was sent to a military hospital in this country and had been in hospital ever since. He had made a fairly good recovery and his parents were expecting him home shortly, when on Thursday last week a wire was received, informing them of his serious illness. Mrs Rousell at once proceeded to Richmond and was able to see her son before he passed away.

Deep sympathy is extended to the relations in their sad bereavement.

Langport & Somerton Herald: Saturday 1st March 1919
Berkshire, Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, Hampshire, history, illness, photography, Private, Royal Army Service Corps, Somerset, story, war

Private Alan Ladd

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Private Alan Ladd

Alan Ladd was born in the summer of 1893, and was one of twins. His parents were plumber and gas fitter George Ladd and his wife Mary Ann, who was a midwife. The couple had eight children altogether, of whom Alan and his twin Arthur were the youngest.

George had been born in Exeter, Devon, and Mary Ann in Somerset, which is where they initially based their family. By 1887, however, they had moved to Berkshire, and were living in Knowl Hill, near Maidenhead, when their youngest four children were born.

The 1911 census found the family living in Dunster, Somerset, where everyone seemed to be bringing in a wage. George and Mary Ann had four of their children living with them, who were employed as an engine driver, grocer, baker’s apprentice and, in Alan’s case, a tailor’s apprentice.

War broke out in 1914, and, in November 1915, Alan enlisted. He joined the Royal Army Service Corps as a Private, and his enlistment papers showed he stood 5ft 5ins (1.65m) tall, and weighed in at 130lbs (59kg). He was stationed at the Corps’ Remount Department in Swaythling, Southampton and thus his military service was completed on the Home Front.

Shortly after enlisting, on 16th April 1916, Alan married Ada Westlake. She lived in the village of Long Sutton, near Langport in Somerset, and the couple married at the Wesleyan Methodist Chapel in Somerton. They do not appear to have gone on to have any children.

Further details of Private Ladd’s life are scant. What can be determined is that he was admitted to Netley Hospital in Southampton on 11th October 1918, having had symptoms of pneumonia for a few days. Sadly, his condition worsened, and Alan passed away just three days later, on 14th October 1918. He was just 25 years of age.

Alan Ladd was brought back to Long Sutton for burial. The war may have led him and Ada to adopt more of a Quaker way of life, as he lies at rest in the Friends Burial Ground on the outskirts of the town.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, Gunner, history, illness, photography, Royal Field Artillery, Somerset, story, Sussex, war, Wiltshire

Gunner Fred Ford

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Gunner Fred Ford

Fred Ford was born in the Wiltshire town of Mere in 1877. One of eight children to John and Charlotte, his father was an agricultural labourer from the village.

When he left school, Fred initially found work as an errand boy; he soon moved into labouring and, by the time of the 1901 census, was employed as a bricklayer.

In 1904, Fred married Florence Phillips; she was the daughter of an agricultural labour from Somerset. Fred, by this time, had found work as a coal miner in the county, and the young couple set up home in the village of Babington, near Frome. They went on to have four children.

Conflict was on the horizon and, while full details of his military service are not available, it’s clear that he enlisted as soon as he was able to, almost as was was declared. Gunner Ford joined the Royal Field Artillery, and was assigned to the 108th Brigade of the regiment’s Ammunition Corps.

Initially based in Taunton, Fred was soon moved to Portsmouth and then Worthing, and it was here, in the first winter of the war, that he contracted influenza and pneumonia. Admitted to St Cecil’s Red Cross Military Hospital in the Sussex town, sadly the condition proved too much for him. He passed away on 8th February 1915, tragically hours before Florence arrived from Somerset. Gunner Ford was just 37 years old.

Finances not enabling her to transport his remains back home, Florence Ford laid Fred’s body to rest in Broadwater Cemetery in Worthing, the town where he died.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, illness, injury, Lance Corporal, photography, Royal Sussex Regiment, story, Sussex, war

Lance Corporal Edgar Godden

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Lance Corporal Edgar Godden

Edgar Godden was born in the summer of 1892, one of eight children to John and Alice Godden. John came from Littlehampton, and Alice from Worthing, and this is where they raised their family.

John was a bricklayer, and it was this trade that Edgar went into when he left school. War was coming to Europe, however, and, within weeks of the conflict breaking out, he had volunteered his services.

Edgar joined the Royal Sussex Regiment, and was assigned to the 7th (Service) Battalion. Details of his military service are a little sketchy, but a newspaper article, written after his death, gives a hint about what happened to him.

Mr Edgar Godden… who was twenty-five years of age and leave a widow and a little child, enlisted on the 1st September 1914, and was wounded in the arm in September of the following year. In October 1916 he was blown up and buried by an enemy mine. Last February he was taken out of the trenches and sent to a hospital in France, and last April he came home to England and had an arm amputated. Since his discharge from the Seventh Royal Sussex Regiment, he had been a member of the staff of the Post Office, and was known as “The One-armed Postman”.

Worthing Gazette: Wednesday 10th January 1918.

In the autumn of 1916, and recovering from his injuries Lance Corporal Godden married Emily Owers. They lived with John and Alice, but I have been unable to find details of the child mentioned in the newspaper report.

It seems that his injuries had left Edgar in a weakened state, and, after a ‘short and painful illness’ [Worthing Gazette: 2nd January 1918], he passed away on 22nd December 1917. He was just 25 years of age.

Edgar Godden was laid to rest, finally at peace, in the Broadwater Cemetery in his home town of Worthing, West Sussex.

The newspaper report above gave a little more information about a couple of Edgar’s siblings.

Mr & Mrs [John] Godden had one son killed in action in November 1916; and still another – the eldest – is now in France, as a member of the Royal Engineers.

Worthing Gazette: Wednesday 10th January 1918

Edgar’s oldest brother – also called John – survived the war, but it was his younger brother, Charles, who was killed in action.

A Corporal in the 11th Battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment, Charles was caught up in the Battle of the Somme. It was while fighting in the Battle of the Ancre on 13th November 1916, that he was killed. He is remembered at the Thiepval Memorial in Northern France, and is also commemorated on Edgar’s own headstone.

One last aside to Edgar’s story is his address in the last few years of his life. John and Alice were living in Worthing, specifically at a house called “Chiswick” in Tarring Road, to the west of the town.

Coincidentally, when researching another soldier, Private Ernest Parsons, this turns out to be the address where he also died, just ten months later on 4th October 1918. There is no apparent other link between the two men.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, illness, London, London Regiment, photography, Post Office Rifles, Rifleman, story, Sussex, war

Rifleman Ernest Parsons

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Rifleman Ernest Parsons

Ernest Charles Parsons was born in 1881, and was one of six children to bricklayer Robert Parsons and his wife Mary Ann. Robert was a labourer and bricklayer from Watford, while Mary Ann was born in Arundel, West Sussex. The couple moved to where his work was, having their first children in Hertfordshire and Sussex They finally settled in London, which was where Ernest was born.

Where he first left school, Ernest worked as a painter, but soon found a career as a postman., something he would continue to do through to the outbreak of war.

Ernest married Frances Olive Eynott on 28th February 1904; they went on to have a daughter, Doris, the following year. It seems, however, that their marriage was destined to be a short one; Frances passed away within a couple of years.

With a daughter to raise and a living to earn, Ernest married again. Elizabeth Kate Dew was born in Fulham in 1883, and the couple married in the spring of 1907. Again, however, their happiness was to be short; Elizabeth died eighteen months later.

Widowed twice, and with Doris now a toddler, Ernest moved back in with his parents in Chiswick. He continued his work as a postman, but alongside this had been an active volunteer in the London Regiment (Post Office Rifles) since early 1908.

Rifleman Parsons’ initial year’s service was extended and extended and, by the time of the outbreak of the First World War, had been serving for some six years.

By 1914, Ernest had found love for a third time, and married Lilian Frances Cromie on 25th March that year. With war imminent, his time was take up more with military duties; while part of the territorial force, Rifleman Parsons had been officially mobilised.

The sudden intermingling of men from different parts of the country in small, packed training camps made the perfect environment for illness and disease to circulate. Ernest had initially contracted bronchitis while on service in 1912; this had dogged him intermittently oved the next few years until, in March 1915, it was serious enough for the Medical Examination Board to declare him unfit for military service.

Ernest moved his family to Worthing, in West Sussex, presumably as the air was fresher there than in the bustling capital. He may also had had family in the area, as his mother had been born just up the road in Arundel. Sadly, though, it seems that his health was not to recover sufficiently, and he passed away on 4th October 1918, at the age of 37.

Ernest Charles Parsons was buried in the Broadwater Cemetery in the town, not far from where his widow and daughter were then living.

Coincidentally, when researching another soldier, Lance Corporal Edgar Godden, this turns out to be the address where he also died, just ten months earlier on 22nd December 1917. There is no apparent other link between the two men.

Commonwealth War Graves, Dorset, Great War, Gunner, history, illness, injury, photography, Royal Garrison Artillery, story, war

Gunner Charlie King

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Shaftesbury

Charlie Stephen King was born in Dorset on 18th October 1888, one of six children to Stephen and Virtue King. Stephen was a painter, glazier and paperhanger from Gillingham, and this is where he and Virtue raised their children.

When Charlie left school, he also went on to become a painter, but specifically for the railways, but whether this was on the rolling stock or stations, is not certain.

In October 1909, Charlie married Bessie Imber, a postman’s daughter from Shaftesbury. The couple set up home in Gillingham, before moving back to Bessie’s home town; they went on to have three children.

War was coming, though, and Charlie enlisted in December 1915. He was not formally called up until August 1916, and was assigned a Gunner in the Royal Garrison Artillery. After initial training, he was sent to the Western Front in March 1917.

Exact details of Gunner King’s service are not available. He was certainly involved in fighting during the summer of that year, and, in September, was wounded. Evacuated back to England with a gunshot wound to his left ankle and shell shock, he was admitted to the War Hospital in Sunderland. Sadly, septicaemia set in, and he passed away on 15th September 1917, at the age of just 28 years old.

Charlie Stephen King’s body was brought back to Dorset, where he was laid to rest in the Holy Trinity Churchyard in Shaftesbury.

Commonwealth War Graves, Dorset, Great War, Hampshire Regiment, history, illness, injury, killed in action, London, photography, Private, Royal Army Service Corps, story, war

Private Sidney Alner

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Private Sidney Alner

Sidney William Alner was born in Shaftesbury, Dorset, in March 1899, one of eleven children to Sidney and Ellen Alner. Sidney Sr was a grocer’s porter, and the family lived on the celebrated Gold Hill in the town.

War was to come when Sidney Jr was only young – he had just turned 15 when it broke out. He saw his older brothers go off to war and was obviously keen to do his bit as well. Until he was old enough, however, he worked as an errand boy for his father’s employers, Stratton Sons and Mead.

His time would come, of course, although dates for Sidney’s enlistment are not clear. A contemporary newspaper record confirms that he arrived in France in January 1918, so it is likely that Private Alner joined up at some point during the previous year.

He joined the Hampshire Regiment, and was assigned to the 1st Battalion. Heavily involved during most of the conflict, the battalion was seen as key to the Final Advance of the autumn of 1918. Private Alner was caught up in the fight to break the Hindenburg Line, fighting on the River Selle and capturing the town of Monchaux.

It was while his battalion was advancing on the village of Préseau on 2nd November, that Private Alner was injured. Shot in the arm, he was evacuated back to England, and admitted to the Cambridge Military Hospital in Aldershot. He would have survived his injuries, had pneumonia not set in, and it was to this that he would succumb on 19th November. He was just 19 years old.

Sidney William Alner’s body was brought back to Dorset. He lies at rest in the Holy Trinity Churchyard in Somerset, within walking distance of his family’s home.

Sidney was the second member of the Alner family to die as a result of the Great War.

His older brother Harry, who had become a chauffeur and went to live in London, joined the Royal Army Service Corps in 1915. Private H Alner had served three years in France when he was killed on the front line just three weeks before his brother. He was 32 years old, and left a widow and two children.

When researching Sidney Alner in newspaper articles, an interesting report surfaced.

An unfortunate accident has happened to a little girl, not quite four years old, the daughter of Sidney Alner, who resides in Gold Hill. Heals’ steam hobby horses visited the town on Friday and Saturday in last week, and on the evening of the former day, Alner took his little girl for a ride on the horses.

Whilst they were in motion, the bolt that kept the horse on which Alner sat with his child attached to the connecting rod came out, and he and the little girl were precipitated to the ground.

Alner escaped without injury, but his daughter had one of her legs fractured above the knee. She was taken home, and Dr Evans set the injured limb. Later in the evening she was removed to the Westminster Cottage Hospital.

Salisbury and Winchester Journal: Saturday 31st October 1891

This Sidney Alner was Private Alner’s father, and the daughter would have been his older sister Sarah. Nothing more is reported of the incident, and Sarah went on to live until 1945, when she was 57 years old.

Commonwealth War Graves, Dorset, Great War, history, illness, Ireland, Lance Corporal, photography, Private, Royal Welsh Fusiliers, story, war

Lance Corporal Reginald Foot

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Lance Corporal Reginald Foot

Reginald Robert Foot was born at the beginning of 1888 in Shaftesbury, Dorset, the oldest of three children to Robert and Annie Foot. Robert was a tailor from the town, who brought up his young family in the comfort of well-known surroundings.

When he left school, Reginald found work as a carpenter and joiner. He was a keen, if over-eager, sportsman, and played for Shaftesbury FC. In May 1906, he was reported for ‘cheeky’ behaviour towards the referee in one match.

In the lead up to the Great War, he also spent some of his his spare time in the Territorial Army and, when war broke out, he was keen to continue doing his bit. He joined the Royal Welch Fusiliers as a Private in December 1915 and, by the time he was shipped out to France in January 1917, he had been promoted to the rank of Lance Corporal.

After a year on the Western Front, Reginald returned to the United Kingdom and, once the Armistice had been declared, his unit was shipped to Ireland. He fell ill while he was out there, and, in January 1919 was admitted to a military hospital in Ireland.

Sadly, the lung conditions he had contracted – influenza and pneumonia – were to get the better of him, and he passed away on 7th February 1919. Lance Corporal Foot was 31 years old.

The body of Reginald Robert Foot was brought back to Dorset; he lies at rest in the Holy Trinity Churchyard in the town of his birth, Shaftesbury.

Commonwealth War Graves, Driver, Great War, history, illness, Norfolk, photography, Royal Field Artillery, Somerset, story, war

Driver Alfred Fear

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Driver Alfred Fear

Alfred Fear was born towards the end of 1898, the youngest of nine children to Charles and Eliza Fear. Charles was a mason from Weston-super-Mare in Somerset, who raised his family in the town of his birth.

Sadly, given his youth, there is little documented about Alfred’s early life. He was still at school at the time of the 1911 census and, while he would have found some sort of employment after leaving, there is no record of what that would have been.

Alfred’s military service records are also sparse. He enlisted in the Royal Field Artillery and was assigned the role of Driver in the 321st Brigade. While dates cannot be confirmed, he would have enlisted before the spring of 1918.

The next two documents relating to Driver Fear are his Pension Ledger record and the Army Register of Personal Effects. These confirms that he passed away on 22nd October 1918 at the Norfolk War Hospital. The cause of death given was infirmation of the brain, (or possibly inflammation of the brain). He was just 20 years old.

Alfred Fear’s body was brought back to Weston-super-Mare for burial. He lies at rest in the town’s Milton Cemetery.

Bugler, Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, illness, injury, photography, Royal Engineers, Sapper, Somerset, story, war

Corporal Harold Mattick

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Corporal Harold Mattick

Harold Mattick was born in the spring of 1895, the youngest of four children to Walter and Augusta. Walter was a harness maker and brought the family up in his home town of Weston-super-Mare, Somerset.

When he left school, Harold found work as a plumber. He seemed to had sought a life of adventure, however, and, in 1908, aged just 14, enlisted in the Wessex Division of the Royal Engineers as a Bugler. He served for five years, fulfilling his duties at the same time as carrying out his plumbing work.

When war broke out, Harold immediately re-enlisted. As a Sapper, he was assigned to the 1st/2nd (Wessex) Field Company. After initial training, he was sent to the front as part of the British Expeditionary Force just before Christmas in 1914.

Sapper Mattick was caught up in some of the fiercest fighting on the Wester Front, including the First and Second Battles of Ypres. On 30th September 1915, at Loos, he received a gunshot wound in his right leg, which fractured his tibia. The Germans were also using gas to attack the Allied front lines, which also affected Harold.

Medically evacuated to England for treatment on 9th October, his condition was such that he was discharged from the army on health grounds six months later, on 30th March 1916.

Sadly, while Harold’s leg healed, the injuries he sustained in the gas attack were too severe for him to recover from. He died at home from a lung condition on 24th July 1917, aged just 22 years old.

Harold Mattick was laid to rest in the Milton Cemetery of his home town, Weston-super-Mare.