Category Archives: South Wales Borderers

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CWG: Serjeant Fred Maynard

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Serjeant Fred Maynard

Details of Fred Maynard’s early life are a challenge to piece together. His First World War service records give his age as 44 years old when he enlisted in September 1914, and confirm his place of birth as Melksham, Wiltshire.

A newspaper report of his funeral gives the name of three brothers – Charles, Frank and Arthur – while only one census return, from 1881, provides a potential match for the family. This suggests Fred’s parents were iron fitter Alfred Maynard and his wife, Deborah, and gives the family’s address as Waterworks Road in Trowbridge.

Fred joined the army in the autumn of 1888. Initially assigned to the Gloucestershire Regiment, he had transferred to the Wiltshire Regiment by the following spring. Private Maynard showed a commitment to duty: in December 1890 he was promoted to Lance Corporal, rising to Corporal in the summer of 1893.

Fred was stood down to reserve status after his seven years’ active duty, but was recalled to the army in December 1899, when war broke out in South Africa. Promoted to Serjeant, he was sent to fight in the Boer War, and was mentioned in dispatches on 2nd April 1901 for special and meritorious service in South Africa. He was stood back down to reserve status in October 1901.

On 21st November 1895, Fred had married Louisa Card. The couple set up home in Trowbridge, but soon moved to London. They went on to have six children: Ernest, Nora and Leslie, who were all born in the London; and Arthur, Martha and Stuart, who were born in Cardiff, the family having moved to Wales by 1910.

The army was not finished with Fred, however, and, within weeks of war breaking out in the summer of 1914, he was called back into service. Given the rank of Serjeant again, he was attached to the South Wales Borderers. Fred was 44 years of age by this point, his service records confirming that he stood 5ft 8ins (1.73m) tall, weighed 164lbs (74.4kg) and had brown hair and hazel eyes.

Attached to one of the regiment’s depots, it seems unlikely that Fred saw service overseas this time around. He was discharged from the army on 1st September 1916 and this seems to have been on medical grounds. Later documents suggest that Serjeant Maynard had been diagnosed with carcinoma of the pylorus, or stomach cancer.

Fred returned to Cardiff, but his time back home was to be short. He was admitted to the Lansdown Road Military Hospital, and passed away on 23rd November 1916. He was 46 years of age.

It seems that Fred’s brother’s had some sway in his funeral. Instead of being laid to rest in Cardiff, where Louisa and the children were living, he was, instead, buried in the Locksbrook Cemetery, Bath, Somerset. His sibling Charles, who was a sergeant in Bath City Police, lived in the city, as did another brother, Frank.

Fred’s headstone also commemorates his and Louisa’s son, Leslie. He had joined the army in the 1920s and, in the summer of 1943, was in Yorkshire, undergoing officer training.

The death of an officer cadet through the accidental discharge of a rifle whose bolt had jammed was described at an inquest…

Captain WH Price said he was in charge of an exercise on the moors which involved the used of small arms and the firing of live ammunition. A squad of cadets lay on the ground in front of a trench firing over a range. All finished firing except Cadet Frank Holroyd, who said his bolt had hammed while firing a second round. [Price] told him to release the bolt by knocking the cocking piece up and back.

This attempt failed, and he told Holroyd to get back into the trench, turn the rifle magazine upwards, place the butt on the side of the trench, and kick the bolt down with his foot. While Holroyd was doing this he noticed Maynard standing in the trench about 4ft away from Holroyd and on his right-hand side.

Captain Price said he saw the rifle was pointing down the range when Holroyd kicked the butt. The cartridge suddenly exploded and Maynard dropped into the trench, shot in the head, and was dead when they reached him.

[Bradford Observer: Saturday 19th June 1943]

Officer Cadet Leslie Maynard was 36 years of age when he was killed. His body was taken back to Somerset for burial: he was laid to rest in the same grave as Fred, father and son reunited after 27 years.

Louisa remained somewhat elusive as time wore on. Fred’s military records confirm that she had moved from Cardiff to the Isle of Wight by 1922. By the time of her son’s death, she was living in Sidcup, Kent.

Commonwealth War Graves, Driver, Egypt, Glamorganshire, Great War, Greece, Hampshire, history, illness, photography, Private, Royal Army Service Corps, Somerset, South Wales Borderers, story, Wales, war

CWG: Driver Charles Shipp

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Driver Charles Shipp

The early life of Charles Shipp is a challenge to unpick. Born Charles Morgan in Bath, Somerset, in 1872, his father was also called Charles. He found work as a labourer when he finished school.

Charles sought a life of adventure, however, and on 7th January 1890, he enlisted in the army, joining the South Wales Borderers. Private Morgan’s service records show that he was 5ft 5.5ins (1.66m) tall and weighed 116lbs (52.6kg). He had brown hair, grey eyes and a fresh complexion, with tattoos of crossed flags, a crown and VR on his left forearm.

Private Morgan spent three years on home soil, and is recorded as being based in North Camp Barracks in Farnborough, Hampshire, in the 1891 census. His battalion was sent to Egypt in December 1892 and spent the next three years overseas, moving to Gibraltar in the spring of 1895. The only details available for his time abroad relate to a couple of hospital admissions – for a fever in Cairo in August 1894, and for gonorrhoea in Gibraltar in the autumn of 1895. He returned to Britain at the end of November that year.

Charles appears to have been based in South Wales when he returned home and, on 20th December 1896, he married Lottie Walters in Llandough Parish Church. Interestingly, while the new bride’s father’s details are recorded – naval pensioner James Walters – Charles’ have been intentionally left blank. This is also the first document on which his surname is recorded as Shipp, so there seems to have been a deliberate distancing from his family at this point.

Charles was still committed to his military career. He served on home soil until January 1897, when he was placed on reserve, having completed seven years’ service. This respite was not to be for long, however, as he was recalled on three years later, and sent to South Africa, to fight in the Second Boer War.

Private Shipp, as he was now known, served in South Africa for more than two years, and was awarded the Johannesburg, Cape Colony, 1901 and 1902 clasps. In August 1902, he returned to Britain, and was formally stood down from army service.

Charles and Lottie moved to Bath, and set up home in a small cottage in Locksbrook Road. They went on to have seven children, all of them girls and, by the time of the 1911 census, Charles was working as a carter for the local gas works. His heart seems always to have been with his military career, however, and, when war broke out in 1915, he saw this as an opportunity to play his part once more.

On 25th October 1915, Charles enlisted in the Royal Army Service Corps as a Driver. His was not to be a war fought on home turf, and within a month, he was in the Mediterranean, potentially back in Egypt again. In April 1916, his battalion moved to Salonika, and he spent the next three years in Northern Greece.

Charles contracted malaria in the autumn of 1917, and this resulted in a hospital admission for just over two months. He returned to his unit, but spent another couple of months in a Macedonian hospital the following year when the condition recurred.

Driver Shipp survived the war, and returned to Britain in April 1919. His health was again suffering, and he was formally discharged from the army on medical grounds on 29th April.

At this point, Charles’ trail goes cold. He returned home to Lottie and their daughters, but there is nothing to account for the the last eight months of his life. He passed away on 12th December 1919, at the age of 47 years of age.

Charles Shipp was laid to rest in Bath’s majestic Locksbrook Cemetery, not far from where his family lived.

Commonwealth War Graves, Glamorganshire, Great War, history, illness, Monmouthshire, photography, Pioneer, Private, Royal Engineers, Somerset, South Wales Borderers, story, war

CWG: Pioneer Herbert Dyer

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Pioneer Herbert Dyer

Charles Herbert Dyer was born in the Somerset village of West Monkton in the spring of 1890. One of eight children, his parents were farm labourer Charles Dyer and his wife Mary.

By the time of the 1911 census, Charles Jr had set out on his own, settling in Briton Ferry, near Port Talbot, Glamorganshire. He found work as a gardener and, from this point on, he went by his middle name, Herbert.

Over the next few years, Herbert continued his employment in Wales, although he did make a move to Newport, Monmouthshire. When war came to Britain, Herbert stepped up to serve King and Country, enlisting in the South Wales Borderers on 10th January 1916. Less than two weeks later, he married Ethel May Andrews, in All Saints’ Church, Newport.

Private Dyer was formally mobilised on 2nd March 1916. His service records show that he was 5ft 10ins (1.78m) tall and weighed 141lbs (64kg). Details of his service are a little scrambled, but is appears that Herbert was initially assigned to the 3rd (Reserve) Battalion, and remained on home soil throughout the conflict.

Herbert was based in Bottesford, Leicestershire, in December 1916, where he was put on report and docked 14 days’ pay for being absent from his post, and refusing to obey a superior’s order. Six months later, he had moved camp, and was confined to barracks for two weeks, and docked two days’ pay for being absent without leave for a day and ten hours.

By the summer of 1918, Herbert had transferred across to the Royal Engineers where, with the rank of Pioneer, he was assigned to the 15th Anti-Aircraft Company. Full details of his time in his new regiment have been lost, but he was certainly based in Essex as the war came to a close.

Pioneer Dyer’s health was, however, beginning to suffer by this point. He had a bout of influenza, which developed into pneumonia. He was admitted to the Warley Military Hospital in Brentwood, on 10th November 1918, but, by this point, his body had seemingly had enough. He passed away at 11:20am on 13th November 1918, at the age of 28 years old.

The body of Herbert Dyer was brought back to Somerset for burial. Ethel had moved in with her in-laws in West Monkton by this point, and was a couple of months’ pregnant. Herbert was laid to rest in the peaceful graveyard of St Augustine’s Church. His son – who Ethel named Herbert – was born on 6th June 1919, never to know his father.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, Gwynedd, history, illness, Lancashire, photography, Private, South Wales Borderers, story, Wales, war, Welch Regiment

CWG: Private Griffith Hughes

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Private Griffith Hughes

Griffith Hughes was born in Llanberis, in modern day Gwynedd, in 1893. Sadly, there is little information about his early life, and records mention his mother – Margaret – but no father. The 1901 census records Griffith as living with his grandmother, Ann Hughes.

Ten year later, the two are living in a two-up, two-down cottage – 19 Snowdon Street, Llanberis – with Griffith’s aunt, Ann’s daughter Jane, and her husband, Thomas. Griffith is earning money by now, working as a slate dresser at one of the local quarries.

War was coming to Europe by this point, and Griffith was called upon to play his part. He initially enlisted in the Welch Regiment as a Private, although he seems to have transferred across to the South Wales Borderers during his service.

Private Hughes’ time in the army was spent on home soil, although he earned the Victory and British Medals for his service. He remained in the army through to the end of the war and beyond until, on 15th August 1919, he was medically discharged. He had developed tachycardia, and this was having an impact on his life.

When Griffith left the army, he was based in Lancashire, and was living in the village of Bryn, to the south of Wigan. He remained in the area for the next year, his health sadly deteriorating. Admitted to the cottage hospital in nearby Pemberton, he passed away from his heart condition on 18th September 1920. He was just 27 years old.

Griffith Hughes was brought back to Wales for burial. He was laid to rest in the quiet graveyard of St Peris Church, in his home village of Llanberis.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, Mid-Glamorgan, photography, Sergeant, Somerset, South Wales Borderers, story, war, Welch Regiment

CWG: Serjeant Albert West

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Serjeant Albert West

Albert Charles West was born in Aldershot, Hampshire, in 1870. The second of nine children, his father Charles was in the army, while his mother Hannah is listed on the 1871 census as a “Soldier’s Wife”.

By the time of the next census, ten years later, Charles had relocated the family to Wells in Somerset – Charles had been born just up the road in Shepton Mallet, so, in effect, he was bringing his family home. By this point, the Wests were a family of seven; Albert had an older sister, Eliza, and three younger siblings, Mary, Joseph and Earnest.

Albert seemed keen to make his own way in the world; by the 1891 census, he had relocated again, this time to South Wales, where he worked as a minor. He boarded with a grocer in the village of Llantwit Fardre. It would have been a bustling house, because Albert was living there with the grocer, his wife and four children and three other lodgers.

The following year, Albert enlisted in the 2nd Battalion Welsh Regiment. Posted to India, he served there for ten of his twelve years’ service.

After completing his enlistment, Albert moved back to Somerset and married Emily Sparrow in Wells. The couple moved back to South Wales for work, however, this time with Albert working in a mine in Llanwonno, ten miles up further up the Taff Valley from Llantwit Fardre.

When war broke out, Albert re-enlisted, this time joining the South Wales Borderers. Sadly, little documentation of his second time in the army remains. He is recorded as having served in the 51st (Graduating) Battalion, which was a training unit based in Suffolk; presumably his experience made him ideal to train others and enabled him to take the rank of Serjeant.

There is nothing to confirm how Serjeant West died. All that is know is that he passed on 9th July 1918. The lack of any media reports around his funeral suggests it is likely to have been illness, rather than injury, that took him. He was 48 years old.

Albert Charles West lies at rest in Wells Cemetery in Somerset.

Charles and Hannah had nine children in total. Two years before Albert passed, their youngest son – Alfred Augustus West – died suddenly and unexpectedly. Records confirm that he was working on the lines at Wells Railway Station, when his foot got caught in the points. Unable to free himself, he was hit by a train and killed.