Arthur Redvers George Bradford was born in the Somerset village of Winscombe on 16th September 1900. He was second of six children to George Bradford, who was a postman, and his wife, Louisa.
When he finished his schooling, Arthur found work as a carter. War was raging across Europe by this point, however, and he was evidently keen not to miss out on the excitement. On 18th September 1918, just two days after his 18th birthday, he enlisted in the Royal Navy.
Stoker 2nd Class Bradford was noted as being 5ft 3.5ins (1.61m) tall, with brown hair, grey eyes and a fresh complexion. He was sent to HMS Vivid, the Royal Naval Dockyard in Devonport, for training, but his time there was to be tragically short.
Cramped barracks prove to be the perfect breeding ground for illness, and in early October 1918, influenza and pneumonia were rife. Around a dozen of Stoker Bradford’s colleagues died from the diseases in the time he was at the base, and, on 5th October 1918, he too was to succumb to them. He was just eighteen years old, and had been in the Royal Navy for just 17 days.
The body of Arthur Redvers George Bradford was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the quiet graveyard of St James the Great Church in his home village of Winscombe.
Ivan George Day was born in the summer of 1898, the oldest of three children to George and Emma Day. George was a brick and tile maker from Weare in Somerset and it was here that he and Emma raised their young family.
When Ivan finished his schooling, he found work as a postman, but, with war raging across Europe, he seemed keen to play his part. In February 1917, he enlisted in the army and was assigned to the 93rd Training Reserve Battalion. His service records show that he was just 5ft 3ins (1.6m) tall and weighed 121lbs (54.9kg).
Private Day was sent to Chiseldon Camp, to the south of Swindon in Wiltshire and, tragically, this move to cramped army barracks was to prove his undoing. Within four weeks of arriving, Ivan was admitted to the camp’s hospital, having contracted measles and pneumonia. Less than a week later, the conditions had gotten the better of him. He passed away on 3rd April 1917, at just eighteen years of age.
Ivan George Day’s body was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the peaceful graveyard of St Gregory’s Church in his home village of Weare.
Tragedy was to strike the Day family again when, George died eighteen months later, aged 51 years old. Emma lived until 89 years old, passing away in Weston-super-Mare in the summer of 1955.
Ivan was not the only Somerset soldier to succumb to pneumonia at Chiseldon Camp that spring. Private Charles Oborne, died from the same condition a few days before Ivan was admitted to the hospital. Private Everett Ferriday, of the 94th Training Battalion, passed away in the same hospital on the same day as Ivan, also from pneumonia.
You can read their stories by following the links above.
Bertie Baden Clark was born on 5th August 1900 in the hamlet of Dunball, near Puriton in Somerset. The third of seven children, his parents were quarry and cement works labourer George Clark and his wife, Bessie.
When war came to Europe, George stepped up to play his part. Despite being 44 years old, he enlisted in the Royal Army Service Corps on 4th November 1915 and, within a year, was in France. He remained posted at the No. 4 Remount Depot until October 1918.
“On the morning of the 1st October 1918, I left the 26th Squadron 4 Base Remount Depot riding a horse and leading one to exercise about a mile & half from the Squadron while proceeding by the side of the railway line my horse was frightened by the whistle of a railway engine & ran away with me throwing me to the road and stepping on my right ankle.”
Private Clark was initially treated at the No. 2 Canadian General Hospital, but was soon invalided back to Britain and placed on furlough until being formally demobbed from the army early in 1919.
Bertie, meanwhile, could see the excitement of the war passing him by. Determine to play is part before it was too late, he gave up his job as a labourer on 13th July 1918 and enlisted in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve.
Given the rank of Ordinary Seaman, his service records confirm that he was 5ft 6in (1.68m) tall (1in, or 2.5cm, taller than his father), with dark brown hair, grey eyes and a fresh complexion. He was noted as having a scar on his right knee.
Bertie was sent to HMS Victory, the Royal Naval Dockyard in Portsmouth, Hampshire, for training. Tragically, this was to be his only posting. He was admitted to the dockyard hospital early in October, suffering from double pneumonia and influenza. The condition was to take his life, and he passed away on 10th October 1918, at the age of just 18 years old.
Bertie Baden Clark’s body was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the quiet graveyard of St Michael’s Church in Puriton, the funeral attended by his family, including his recently returned father, George.
Cyril Spencer Wilson was born on 12th July 1883 in Charlcombe, Somerset. The youngest of three children, his parents were John and Edith Wilson. John was a solicitor who went on to become President of the Bath Law Society and, because of his standing, Cyril and his siblings had a comfortable upbringing: all three censuses covering his life – in 1891, 1901 and 1911 – all show the family living in a large villa in Charlcombe, with a cook and a housemaid to support them.
[Cyril] was educated at Bath College and Lancing College, and then studied engineering at Bristol University. He then became an articled pupil at the Great Western Railway Works at Swindon. Very interested in, and a keen supporter of, the Territorial movement, he was a Captain of the [Royal Engineers] Wilts Fortress Engineers when war broke out.
Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette: Saturday 2nd November 1918
Cyril had begun work for the Great Western Railway in July 1902, and became attached to the Institute of Civil Engineers the following January.
Captain Wilson formally enlisted when war was declared, and was soon sent to France. “He was awarded the Military Cross early in the summer of 1917, after being twice mentioned in despatches for excellent work.” [Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette: Saturday 2nd November 1918]
Cyril was promoted to Major soon after this, and would go on to serve in France for more than a year more. In February 1918 he married Amy Pounds, the daughter of a bank clerk from East London and the couple exchanged vows in the city.
Major Wilson returned to France, but contracted dysentery that summer. He returned to Britain to recuperate, but came down with pneumonia, and this was to take his life. He died on 27th October 1918, aged 35 years old.
Cyril Spencer Wilson’s body was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the family plot in St Mary’s Churchyard, Charlcombe.
William Bruton was born on 9th August 1899, the oldest of two children to William and Kate Bruton. William Sr was a grocer from Charlcombe to the north of Bath, Somerset, but it was in the Walcot area of Bath itself that the family settled.
Kate died in November 1904, at the age of just 35 years old, and William Sr raised his children on his own. He married a second time, to Edith Elly in 1910, and the couple went on to have a daughter, Mona, the following year.
William Jr – who was known as Willie, to avoid confusion with his father – was still in school at the time of the 1911 census, but when he left a few years later, he found work as an engine cleaner. War had come to Europe by this point, but to begin with Willie was too young to play his part.
He finally got his chance to enlist towards the end of the conflict, and joined the Royal Navy as an Ordinary Seaman on 18th July 1918. His service document record that Willie was 5ft 11ins (1.8m) tall, with brown hair, hazel eyes and a fresh complexion. He was also noted as having a scar on his upper lip.
Ordinary Seaman’s first posting was to be HMS Victory, the Royal Naval Dockyard in Portsmouth, and, tragically, this was also to be his last. Within a matter of weeks he had contracted pneumonia, and he passed away from the condition on 12th September 1918. He was just 19 years of age.
William Bruton was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the family plot in Lansdown Cemetery, overlooking the city of his birth.
Alfred Henry Collins was born on 22nd August 1886, in the Gloucestershire village of Wotton-under-Edge. One of five children, his parents were cowman and farm labourer Samuel George Collins and his wife, Jane. Samuel’s work took the family south, and by the time of the 1901 census, the Collinses had settled in Whitchurch, near Bristol.
When Alfred finished his schooling, he also found employment labouring on a farm, but he was drawn to a more reliable career and a life at sea. On 9th March 1903, Alfred enlisted in the Royal Navy. His service records show the young man he was becoming. He was 5ft 4ins tall, with brown hair, brown eyes and a fresh complexion.
Alfred was still underage in the navy’s eyes, and so he was given the rank of Boy 2nd Class. He was assigned to HMS Northampton, a training ship, and must have shown some promise, as within three months he had been promoted.
In June 1903, Boy 1st Class Collins was assigned to HMS Victory, the Royal Naval Dockyard in Portsmouth, Hampshire, and his trajectory was still upwards. When he turned seventeen on 22nd August, Alfred was formally enrolled in the Royal Navy, and was given the rank of Ordinary Seaman. However, his training in Portsmouth continued, and by November he had become a Signalman.
In December 1903 he was posted to the cruiser HMS Isis and, over the next decade he served on ten different ships, returning to HMS Vivid, the Royal Naval Dockyard in Devonport, in between voyages. During this time he was promoted to Leading Signalman, and his annual reviews showed him as having a very good character and a superior ability.
With war now brewing across Europe, the role of the navy intensified. When conflict was declared, Leading Signalman Collins was serving on board the cruiser HMS Pomone and, after nine months back at HMS Vivid, possibly in a training role, Alfred was assigned to the newly-refitted battleship HMS Bellerophon, on board which he would serve for more than two years.
Bellerophon served at the Battle of Jutland, and remained patrolling the southern part of the North Sea for the rest of the war. In July 1917, Alfred was promoted again, to Yeoman of the Signals, and transferred to HMS King George. He remained in the North Sea, but his new ship was there to protect the convoys transporting good between the UK and Norway, so he was based in Scotland.
Yeoman of the Signals Collins survived the war, but in February 1919 he was admitted to the Royal Naval Hospital in Granton, near Edinburgh, suffering from pneumonia. Sadly, the condition was to get the better of him and he died on 14th February 1919, at the age of 32 years old. He had served for just short of sixteen years.
The body of Alfred Henry Collins was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the graveyard of St Nicholas’ Church in Whitchurch.
Arthur Coward was born in the village of Faulkland, near Radstock, Somerset, on 6th November 1888. One of twelve siblings, of which only five survived childhood, his parents were Henry and Mercy Coward.
Henry was an agricultural labourer, who was 62 years of age when Arthur was born. By the time Arthur had finished his schooling, the family had moved west, to Writhlington, and he took up work in the local colliery.
Arthur was a keen motorcyclist, and when war came to Europe, he enlisted in the Royal Engineers. Working as a dispatch rider, Sapper Coward was assigned to the 34th Division Signal Company, and soon found himself in France.
Arthur returned home for a fortnight’s leave on 22nd October 1918. “He should have returned to France again on the 4th [November] but had a few days previously contracted influenza and this was followed by double pneumonia. Everything possible was done for him, but despite a robust constitution he gradually sank and died peaceful a few hours before the public learnt that the war in which he had taken part was ended.” [Somerset Guardian and Radstock Observer: Friday 15th November 1918]
Sapper Coward had died on 11th November 1918, having celebrated his thirtieth birthday just five days previously. His father, Henry, had lost another child, at the age of 91.
Arthur Coward was laid to rest in the tranquil Writhlington Cemetery.
Edwin Joseph Fricker was born on 2nd June 1898 in Vobster, Somerset. The youngest of nine children, his parents were Frederick and Ann, both of whom had been born just over the Wiltshire border in Zeals. Frederick was an agricultural labourer and, based on the places of birth of their children, it would seem that the family moved where his work took him.
Frederick died in the spring of 1911, at the age of 58. The census return, which was taken just a few months later, found the now-widowed Ann living at Stone Ash Cottage in Mells, with four of her children: Edwin and three of his older siblings: Pollie, James and Fred. Edwin’s brothers were bringing money into the home – James as a stone quarrier, and Fred as a pony boy, working underground in the local mines.
When war came to Europe, Edwin stepped up to play his part. While his service records have been lost, it is clear that he enlisted in the Devonshire Regiment, and was attached to the 10th (Service) Battalion.
The death of Pte. Edwin Joseph Fricker, of the Somerset Light Infantry, has recently taken place at the early age of 20 years. Deceased was called up from Bristol and was sent to India and after the signing of the Armistice was demobilised to return to his work in the mine. The cause of death was ague and pneumonia.
[Somerset Standard: Friday 28th February 1919]
The newspaper report of Edwin’s passing includes some inconsistencies: Private Fricker was not assigned to the Somerset Light Infantry, nor is there any evidence that he spent any time overseas. He did die from pneumonia, however, passing away on 16th February 1919: he was 20 years of age.
Edwin Joseph Fricker was laid to rest in the graveyard of St Edmund’s Church, Vobster, not far from where his mother still lived.
Alfred Taylor was born in the summer of 1888 in Crewkerne, Somerset. The second of twelve children, his parents were Henry and Selina Taylor. Henry, who was also known as Harry, was a stone mason, but when Alfred and his siblings left school, they went into the weaving industry, a key employer in the area.
War came to European shores in the summer of 1914, and Alfred was keen to play his part. He had already been a part of the 3rd (Special Reserve) Dorset Regiment, but formally enlisted on 9th December 1915, joining the Royal Garrison Artillery. His service records note that he was 5ft 9ins (1.77m) tall and weighed 149lbs (67.6kg). The document also confirms his next of kin as his father, who, at 48 years old, had also joined up, and was serving in the Royal Engineers in Canterbury, Kent.
Gunner Taylor was not mobilised until September 1916, and served the next eighteen month on home soil. He did his initial training in Hilsea, Portsmouth, before moving around the country. He finally made it to France in February 1918.
During his time in France, Alfred was caught up in a couple of gas attacks, and was evacuated to Britain at the end of August because of the impact on his lungs. Admitted to the 2nd Eastern General Hospital in Brighton, Sussex, his body finally succumbed to pneumonia. He passed away on 25th January 1919, at the age of 30 years old.
The body of Alfred Taylor was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the Townsend Cemetery of his home town, Crewkerne. “…All the members of Gunner Taylor’s family were present, except his father and his brother George, who [were] with the Army of Occupation in Germany.” [Western Chronicle: Friday 7th February 1919]
Henry – or Harry – Sweet was born on 31st July 1887 in the Somerset village of Merriott. He was the fourth of seven children to Edward and Emma Sweet. Emma had married Edward after her first husband, John, had died, and so Harry also had three half-siblings.
Edward was an agricultural labourer by trade, but by the time of the 1901 census he had turned his hand to brewing, and listed his trade as a maltster. Harry’s older brother John, was also recorded as a maltster, while he had left school and was noted as being a brewery hand.
The next census, in 1911, found Emma and Edward heading up the family in Crewkerne, brewing for, and working at, the Volunteer Inn. Harry was working with his father, while two of his sisters – Prudence and Beatrice – were still living at home and working as shirt and collar machinists. Making up the household were Harry’s other sister, Ellen, who was a shirt ironer, and her husband George, who was recorded as a web weaver. In all there were seven wages coming into the household, meagre salaries though they may have been.
On 26th December 1911, Harry married Rosina Woodland in the parish church in Crewkerne. She was the daughter of Walter Woodland, a local labourer, although there is little further information on her family.
When war came to Europe, Harry wanted to play his part. Full details of his military service are lost to time, although he had certainly enlisted in the Royal Army Service Corps by the start of 1917. Driver Sweet served in the Eastern Mediterranean, and was ensconced in Salonika, in Northern Greece, for nearly two years.
Harry suffered on and off with dysentery, and was moved to the 4th Scottish General Hospital in Glasgow in January 1919 for treatment. This was initially successful, but while was was admitted he contracted a combination of bronchitis and pneumonia, and these were ultimately to take his life. Driver Sweet passed away on 13th February 1919, at the age of 31 years old.
Henry Sweet’s body was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the Townsend Cemetery in his home town of Crewkerne.
Death and Service 