John Henry Armes was born in Cannock, Staffordshire in 1881. One of eight children to Richard and Mary Armes, his father was a colliery worker and labourer. After their mother’s untimely death in 1890, this was a trade into which his three boys – Richard Jr, John and Alfred – followed.
The 1901 census finds John living with his widowed father and working as a coal hewer. A year later, he married Caroline Caldwell and, by the outbreak of the war, the couple were living in Ilkeston, Derbyshire with their growing family of seven children.
Records of John’s enrolment are not evident, but it is likely to have been later in the war, rather than earlier, given that his trade was one of those protected from enlistment.
By 1915, Caroline had given birth to the couple’s seventh child and John had signed up to the King’s Royal Rifles, stationed at the fort in Grain, North Kent.
Rifleman Armes’ pension record shows that he was accidentally killed on active service, and the contemporary media pick up the story.
[He] had been on outpost duty. On coming off duty about half-past seven on Monday morning he placed his rifle in a rack in a hut, and went to breakfast. Another rifleman names John Bathams Olliff, picked up the rifle to unload it, but having trouble with the extractor he took the magazine of the rifle out, and then thinking all the cartridges were in the magazine he pressed the trigger to close the bolt of the rifle, and a shot went off. At that moment Rifleman Armes came round the door of the hut and received a bullet in the chest.
Exclaiming, “My God, Armes is here,” Olliff rushed to his assistance, and Armes said “I am done for. It was an accident.” Medical aid was telephoned for, but Armes died shortly after the doctor arrived.
Est Kent Gazette: Saturday 5th February 1916
An inquest was held, which found that the two Johns were great friends and had asked to serve together. The jury exonerated John Olliff from blame and recorded a verdict of accidental death.
John Henry Armes died at the age of 34, likely without seeing his youngest child. He lies at rest in St James’ Churchyard in the village of Grain in Kent, close to the barracks where he lost his life.
There are a couple of other protagonists in this story.
John’s widow, Caroline, married again later in 1916, to a George Chapman. She went on to live to the age of 77, outliving three of her children and both of her husbands.
John Battams Olliff, who had accidentally shot John, was born in London in 1880. The son of a butcher, he had emigrated to Canada in 1911. John returned to the UK to fight in the war, joining the King’s Royal Rifles in May 1915. Little information about his post-war survives, but it appears that he remained in England. There is no record of him marrying, but he died in 1938, at 58 years old.
When carrying out research on the Commonwealth War Graves, information remains tantalisingly elusive.
Sometimes just you can chance upon one document and the life of the person behind the name is laid out in front of you.
But in the majority of cases, the someone’s history has to be pieced together from a combination of sources.
Henry Harry Trevitic was born in around 1879 in Burton-upon-Trent, Staffordshire.
There are no records of Trevetics in and around that area at that time, nor are there any permutations of his surname – Trevethick or Trevithick, for example.
The first evidence I have found of Harry is on his military service records. He enlisted in the King’s Royal Rifles in August 1897, listing himself as a ‘cycle fitter’. The document asks if the applicant has previously served in the armed forces; Harry’s reply is that he is in the militia – the 4th Worcestershire Regiment.
Rifleman Trevetic’s military career is extensive; his records show continual service in the King’s Royal Rifles from 1897 to his death in 1915. This included three years in South Africa, two in India and eight months as part of the British Expeditionary Force within weeks of the outbreak of World War One.
The 1901 census finds Rifleman Trevetic at a convalescent home in Hanbury, near Droitwich, along with eleven other soldiers. He is marked as a Visitor, rather than a Resident, so it can be assumed that the owner of the home, whose brother is party of the military party, has put them up for the night (or longer).
Harry next turns up in 1902 when, in December, he married Frances Boyes in Southampton. His military career continued, however, and moving to the 1911 census, and Rifleman Trevetic is barracked in Woolwich. He is listed as married, while Frances is also based in the town, in female quarters.
While the details of his early life are pretty scarce, those surrounding his passing are much more in depth. Because of the circumstances, an inquest into his passing was ordered into his death; this included four pretty in-depth witness statements.
In January 1914, Rifleman Trevetic was appointed as an assistant to Captain Adjutant Makins in Winchester. In August of that year he was shipped with Makins to France and remained his servant.
On 14th September, Captain Makins was badly injured, and Harry helped carry him to the church in the village of Soupir in France, which was acting as a dressing station.
In Makins’ own words “there were 300 wounded closely packed, occupying the whole of the floor space. The groans and the smell, night and day were most distressing. Fresh wounded were constantly being carried in and dead carried out. Shell fire was constant and the general conditions were such as would severely try a highly strung man. During all this time, [Rifleman Trevetic] was my only attendant.”
Makins was moved to various hospitals in France, always accompanied by Rifleman Trevetic and eventually invalided home. Given the seriousness of Captain Makins’ injury, he was permitted to bring Harry back home with him.
On 1st March 1915, Captain Makins was passed fit for general service, and rejoined his battalion, along with his servant. Conscious that he may be sent back to the Front at any point, he warned Harry to be prepared for France again.
Captain Makins’ testimony takes up the tragic story.
On March 9th, he came to me and asked if I would see the Doctor on his behalf privately. He told me that every since his time in the dressing station at Soupir, his nerves had been ajar, and that he could neither eat nor sleep. He asked whether I could get the Doctor to do something for him, as he feared if he went sick in the ordinary way, he would be passed unfit for the front, and be unable to accompany me there, which he was very keen on doing.
Later in the day he came to me and asked me to take no notice of what he had said in the morning, that as a matter of fact he had taken to drink, which was the true cause of his trouble, and that he was entirely giving it up and would be right within a week.
His whole manner was strange and he appeared under the impression that I had discharged him. This was the first intimation I had of any strangeness in his manner.
Being busy I did not pay the attention to it that perhaps I should, more especially as I knew him to be a thoroughly sober and reliable man.
The following day he called me as usual.
About 8:30 am I was called from the mess and asked to proceed to my room at once. On arrival, I found the door locked, and various Officers’ servants outside. The key was on the inside of the door but so turned that the body of Rifleman Trevetic could be seen through the keyhole lying on the floor.
I broke open the door and found Rifleman Trevetic shot through the heart, my revolver lying by his side. The revolver contained one empty shell, I cannot say where this was obtained. There were a few rounds of ammunition in the room, but the marks did not correspond nor am I able to trace any similar ammunition in the Fort.
Captain G Makins’ statement, Inquest from Rifleman Trevetic’s service records
Three other servicemen gave statements into the tragic events of that day, and all summed up Harry’s demeanour in the same way as Captain Makins.
Rifleman Trevetic has throughout his service to me, been a model servant, and had during my time in hospital not only been invaluable to me, but also to the hospitals themselves. He was very happily married, and constantly spoke affectionately of his wife and as far as I can tell, was in no financial difficulties.
Captain G Makins’ statement, Inquest from Rifleman Trevetic’s service records
The inquest found that his death was self-inflicted and “at the time he shot himself he was temporarily insane, and that his mental condition was clearly caused by what he saw and went through when on Active Service in France, and that there was no other contributory cause.”
Temporary insanity, shell shock, war neurosis, combat stress, cowardice; however it was badged Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is commonly recognised these days, but was frowned upon in the Great War.
Sadly, while appearing eager to accompany his superior, it seems that the thought of actually returning to the Western Front was so terrifying to Rifleman Trevetic, that he felt there was only one route out. He was 36 years old.
Harry Trevetic lies at rest in the quiet graveyard of St James’ Church on the Isle of Grain, metres from the fort where he ended his life.
Harry’s widow Frances lived on. Whilst there was no mention of her husband’s death in the newspapers of the time, she received a handsome war gratuity and a pension that reflected Harry’s long service. She went on to marry again in 1917, to Jack Finch, a Sergeant in Harry’s battalion.
Given the stigma around mental health in the early twentieth century, and, it is amazing that the documents have survived as part of the Harry’s military records. The inquest into his death was carried out within days of his passing, and I find the findings of the report forward thinking in the way that it was written.
Harry was obviously a man who experienced way more than his mind was able to cope with – the trauma of that dressing station must have been so much worse than he had seen before during his two decades’ military service. But the report is clear in that it apportions blame for his death on the fighting and bloodshed in France; this was clearly out of character for Harry, and it was his experiences in the field of battle that drove him to his death.
What is less clear is how much Frances was told of his death. While the inquest was decisive, suicide was as much of a stigma as shell shock at that time. Would the King’s Royal Rifles have be honest with her about how he died? Or, while they where internally open, would they have pulled ranks around their own and protected Frances from the truth and themselves from rebuke?
What I have discovered while researching the Commonwealth War Graves, is that, despite the general themes I find, the people behind the names always have an individual story to tell. Sometimes that story raises an eyebrow, or produces a gasp.
Such was the story of Private Harry Pullen.
What raised the eyebrow? Two words, written on the Army Records of Soldiers’ Effects.
Accidentally Drowned.
Harry Pullen was born in Shirehampton, Gloucestershire in 1886. His father, Robert Edward Pullen, was a carpenter; he and his wife Hannah Presulga Cissy Pullen had three other children, Gwendoline, Herbert and John.
By the time of the 1901 census, Robert is boarding in a house in Bristol with his three sons; Hannah and Gwendoline are not listed (nor do they appear on any other census records I have been able to locate).
Harry is listed as a Telegraph Boy, as is his brother Herbert, but he seemed to have wanted to take up a trade; by 1910 he had moved up to London.
In March of that year, Harry married Harriet Critchell, a spinster fifteen years his senior. On their marriage records for Christ Church, St Pancras, Harry lists himself as a tradesman. The census a year later confirms this – head of the household, he is an Agent for the Provident Clothing Supply Company. (Founded in Bradford, West Yorkshire, Provident’s mission was to help working-class families provide for themselves through the use of vouchers. These were exchanged for goods in local shops, and paid for in affordable instalments.)
Harry enlisted at some point after 1916. His regiment, the 1st (Reserve) Garrison Battalion of the Suffolk Regiment, was not formed until March of that year, and, after starting in Buckinghamshire, it moved to Tilbury in Essex and Gravesend in Kent. The battalion was finally settled in Grain, North Kent in 1918, and it was here that he served.
Here the trail goes frustratingly cold…
Private Pullen’s enlistment and service records are not available, so research is limited to the Army Register of Soldier’s Effects and the Pension Ledgers.
All we have about his death are those two words – Accidental Drowning. There are no contemporary news reports of his passing, which you might expect given the circumstances, so the circumstances surrounding his death are elusive.
Private Pullen died on 10th July 1918. He was 31 years old.
His records confirm that Harriet was entitled to a weekly pension of 15s for the duration of the war and twelves months after.
Harry Pullen is buried in the graveyard of St James’ Church in Grain, Kent, close to where he was stationed.
Harold Stanley Russell was born in 1895, the third of six children to carpenter Henry Russell and his wife Mary. The family lived in Sherborne, Dorset, and this is where Harold grew up; by the time of the 1911 census, he was working as a hairdresser in the town.
While Harold’s military records are not readily available online, his last few weeks can be determined through the local press of the day.
He enlisted in the Dorsetshire Regiment in the summer of 1915, but was attached to the Wiltshire Regiment when battalions went to France in May 1916.
Lance Corporal Russell’s Lieutenant wrote to his parents to report on Harold’s injury:
[He] was wounded by a bomb on the morning of July 28th while on duty in the trenches. “At the moment of writing I do not know if it is a very serious case, but I do know he will lose the use of his left hand. He was a most popular fellow, and always willing to do his part nobly with a brave heart, and nothing grieved me more than to see him in pain. His wants were immediately attended to, and I suppose by now he is under treatment in the hospital. He is being well cared for, and the authorities will let you know how he is progressing.
Western Gazette, Friday 4th August 1916
A week later, the newspaper reported an update:
Lance-Corporal Harold Russell… is now at the Leicester Military Hospital in a critical condition. His parents were telegraphed for on Friday last, and visited him. They found he had been very seriously wounded by a bomb whilst on duty in the trenches in France. His injuries are in the chest and right arm, while his left hand has been amputated. [He] was acting platoon-sergeant at the time he was wounded, and had taken part in three battles. After being wounded he walked one and a-half miles to the dressing-station, but afterwards collapsed. His parents returned to Sherborne on Tuesday as he was slightly better, but were telegraphed for again on Wednesday.
Western Gazette, Friday 11th August 1916
The day of the second article, Lance Corporal Harold Russell lost his fight for life, dying in a Military Hospital in Leicester. He was just 21 years old.
The next week, the young soldier featured in the newspaper again, with an 80-line report on his funeral being featured on the Roll of Honour page.
Harold Stanley Russell lies at rest in the cemetery of his home town, Sherborne.
Quinton Charles Wyatt was born in the Gloucestershire town of Northleach in 1893 to William and Elizabeth. His mother died when he was a toddler, leaving William to look after Quinton and his older sister Agnes.
By the time war was declared, Quinton was working as a farm labourer and waggoner in the Gloucestershire village of Hampnett.
Quinton enlisted in the 8th Battalion of the South Staffordshire Regiment on 22nd November 1915. Appointed Lance Corporal just two months later, he was posted to France in March 1916.
Neglect of duty in June meant that Lance Corporal Wyatt was demoted to Private four months later. His battalion was caught up in a German gas attack in the autumn of 1917, and he was injured; ultimately, he was medically discharged from the Army on Boxing Day 1917.
Quinton Charles Wyatt finally succumbed to his injuries on 11th November 1918 – Armistice Day. He was 25 years old.
He is buried in St Mary’s churchyard in the village of Charlton Mackrell in Somerset.
Edwin Robert Hann was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, to Albert Edward and Jemima Jane Hann in around 1900. Albert had been born in Glastonbury, Somerset, but had emigrated by the 1890s, where he met and married Jemima.
Research has led me to numerous dead ends regarding Edwin’s life. Hann’s tombstone shows that he enlisted in the 2nd Regiment of the South African Infantry.
The 2nd Regiment served in numerous key battles on the Western Front, including Ypres, Passchendaele, Marrieres Wood and Messines. Their last major engagement was at Le Cateau in early October 1918. Given how soon afterwards Private Hann passed away, it seems possible that he was fatally wounded – or at least suffered trauma – during this battle.
His war pension records suggest that he died at a military hospital in Woking, Surrey. A little research suggests that, unless this was the medical wing of the local army barracks, then it is likely that Hann was treated at the former Brookwood Hospital (at the time known as Brookwood Asylum or the Surrey County Lunatic Asylum).
While I can find nothing concrete to confirm this, other Brookwood records suggest that fellow patients were either suffering the effects of shell shock or mustard gas. It is reasonable to assume, therefore, that Private Hann passed away as an indirect result of the fighting on the front, rather than a direct one.
Edwin Robert Hann died aged just 18 years old. His body was brought back to his grandparents, and he lies at rest in the cemetery in Glastonbury, Somerset.
Walter Ernest Hartnell was born in 1888 to William and Jane Hartnell in Charlton Musgrove, on the outskirts of Wincanton in Somerset.
One of eight children, it appears he could have been a bit of a tearaway in his youth; in October 1905, the Shepton Mallet Journal reports on a “Hobbledehoy Nuisance” in Evercreech, when a Walter Hartnell was caught with nine of his friends causing a disturbance close to the church.
They were shouting, racing after each other up and down the road, using obscene language, and smoking cigarettes. This continued till 7.15, about half an hour.
Shepton Mallet Journal – Friday 20th October 1905
Hartnell was fined 5/- and 2/6 costs, or would face ten days in prison.
Things looked up for Walter and, by the time his call to enlist came, he was working on the railways. He joined the Somerset Light Infantry and the Machine Gun Corps (MGC), while his brother Fred fought in the Royal Artillery.
The MGC was a particularly brutal part of the armed forces. Of the 170,500 officers and men who served in the corps, 62,049 became casualties, including 12,498 killed, earning it the nickname ‘the Suicide Club’.
Details of Private Hartnell’s death are sketchy; his company saw action at Ypres and Arras. However, records suggest that he died in Colchester; the Military Hospital there was used to dealing with troops straight from the Front. It is likely that he was injured at Ypres and shipped back home to recuperate, but died of his injuries.
This is all conjecture on my part, of course, but either way, Private Walter Hartnell lies at peace in a quiet cemetery at Evercreech in Somerset.
Thomas Edward Moody was born in 1890, the second of five children for Thomas and Emily.
By the start of the war, “Little Tommy Moody” was working with his father in the quarries around Shepton Mallet and was the eldest son living at home.
He joined the North Somerset Yeomanry and was shipped out to France, where he was badly injured. An article in the Shepton Mallet Journal, included after his funeral, says as much about the life of this young man as it does about the Edwardian approach to military matters.
DEATH AND FUNERAL OF A SOLDIER – The death has taken place of Thomas Edward Moody, son of Thomas Moody, of Stoney Stratton, Evercreech, at the age of 18, and who as a 1914 man, joined the North Somerset Yeomanry and went out to France. He was badly wounded, resulting in the loss of an eye, and after some time in hospital and a short leave at home, he was sent back to rejoin his regiment, the 3rd Reserve Cavalry, in France. This was about two years ago. He spent his last leave home at Christmas. After a time in hospital at Devonport, he was removed to Bath early last month, discharged from the army as incurable, and there he died on May 5th, the cause of death being consumption of the brain. The funeral, on Saturday afternoon last, was of military character. The corpse, brought from Bath the day before, was borne from the deceased’s home at Stratton on a hand bier, attended by a bearer party of eight men from Taunton Military Barracks, to the Parish Church, where the first portion of the service was taken. The Union Jack enshrouded the coffin, on and around which a number of floral tributes rested. Sixty members of the Evercreech Branch of the Comrades of the Great War, and a couple of marines, joined the funeral cortege at the home, and on leaving the Church lines up on either side, as the body of their dead comrade was borne hence on the shoulders of four of their number to the cemetery. The vicar, Rev. RY Bonsey, officiated. The Last Post was sounded by Bugler Tucker, of Shepton Mallet, and another bugler from Tauton Barracks. “Little Tommy Moody”, as he was familiarly called amongst his chums, was a conspicuous member of the Evercreech Football Club previous to the War.
Shepton Mallet Journal – 9th May 1919.
(It is interesting to know that the date of death in the article does not match that on the gravestone. I would be inclined to believe the latter.)
Private Moody was obviously a fighter and a strong character – returning to the front after losing an eye, some time in hospital and a short leave – and you can guarantee he was missed in the village.
Thomas Edward Moody lies at rest in the cemetery of his home town, Evercreech.
Arthur James Ashford was born in the Dorset village of Okeford Fitzpaine, to John and Tryphina Ashford. His father died when Arthur was only seven years old, leaving Tryphina to raise him and his three siblings.
Arthur had had a military career before the start of the Great War. He had enlisted into the Dorsetshire Regiment in 1891 and, while I have not been able to locate his records from that time, the regiment had been stationed in Ireland in the 1890s.
In 1899 he married Amy Upshall, at which point he was employed as a labourer. The couple had six children, though sadly, two of them – Arthur George and Elsie May – died in childhood.
He enlisted within months of the First World War beginning, returning to the Dorsetshire Regiment he had previously served on 30th September 1914. (It is interesting that on his enlistment papers he said that he had previously served for 12 years, although the dates don’t fully tally up.) This time, however, Private Ashford served on the Home Front, in Dorchester and Portland.
On the evening of 22nd December 1916, Arthur fell down a gulley in Portland. He was taken to the Verne Military Hospital in the town, but died of his injuries – a fractured skull – in the early hours of the following day.
Private Arthur Ashford was buried in his home village of Evercreech on Thursday 28th December 1916.
Richard Edwin Prout was born in 1896, the second son of Frederick and Anna (Hannah) Prout. When his father died in 1908, his mother remarried and by the 1911 census, Richard and his family had moved to Lydeard St Lawrence, where he was a baker’s boy.
He enlisted in June 1914, joining the Somerset Light Infantry and served throughout the war, receiving the Mons Star, Victory Medal and General Service Medals.
After the war, he continued in the army, and was assigned to Taunton Barracks.
His passing was unusual enough for it to be reported on in the local newspaper.
Sergt. Prout, it was stated at the Barracks yesterday, had been on leave for some days prior to his departure for Ireland, and had been spending his furlough at Crowcombe, where his parents live. On the evening of his death, he left home, after taking a hearty meal, to catch the 7.25 train to Taunton. He had to walk a mile to Crowcombe station, most of the way uphill. Early the following morning his dead body was discovered lying face downwards by the roadside, about 50 yards from the station. The body was removed to his home, and Dr. Frossard, of Bishop’s Lydeard, was called in to make a post-mortem examination. The doctor has reported that death was due to asphyxia brought on by over exertion on a full stomach, and syncope, following pressure on the neck by the tightness of the collar of his outside jacket, the doctor adding that he had great difficulty in unfastening the collar.
Western Daily Press – Friday 20th February 1920
A genuine case of someone going before their time. Having visited Lydeard St Lawrence, I recognise the hill he would have had to have climbed to reach the station, and it’s steep enough in a car, let alone walking up it.
Sergeant Prout, the newspaper reported, was generally esteemed by his fellow company, and at his funeral he received full military honours.
Richard Edwin Prout lies peacefully in the churchyard of Lydeard St Lawrence.
Death and Service 