Alexander Popham Spurway was born on 8th April 1891 in Newbury, Berkshire. He was the second of six children to Edward and Gertrude Spurway. Edward was a clergyman, and the family moved to Heathfield in Somerset when Alexander was a small boy. Education was key to Edward and, the 1901 census records show Alexander as being a boarder at the Portmore School in Weymouth, Dorset.
Reverend Spurway set the family up well in Heathfield: by the time of the next census in 1911, the family were living in the village rectory, with five members of staff.
Alexander, meanwhile, had taken a different route, entering the Royal Naval College at Osborne on the Isle of Wight in January 1904. He was a keen sportsman and, while there, he represented the college at both cricket and football.
In September 1908, he passed out from the college as a Midshipman, and served on HMS Canopus in the Mediterranean. His career continued, and he was made Sub-Lieutenant in December 1911, and Lieutenant two years later.
Reverend Spurway died at home in February 1914 and, by the time war broke out, Lieutenant Spurway was assigned to HMS Achilles. He remained on board the cruiser for the next two years and it was during this time that he developed diabetes: something that was to prove an ongoing issue for him.
Returning home in the autumn of 1915, the condition was to prove too much, and he passed away on 29th November 1915, at the age of 24 years old.
Alexander Popham Spurway was laid to rest in the graveyard of his late father’s church, St John the Baptist in Heathfield.
Lieutenant Spurway (from findagrave.com)
Sadly, Alexander was not the only member of the Spurway family to lose their life as a result of the war.
Richard Popham Spurway, Alexander’s older brother, was a 2nd Lieutenant in the Somerset Light Infantry, and was attached to the Hampshire Regiment, when it was moved to Gallipoli in 1915. He was killed on 13th August 1915, and is commemorated on the Helles Memorial at Canakkale, Turkey.
Alexander’s younger brother, George Vyvyan Spurway, joined the Royal Fusiliers, before transferring to the Machine Gun Corps. He had arrived in France in September 1916, and was killed while fighting on the Western Front on 28th March 1918. He was laid to rest at Arras and is commemorated on the memorial there.
William Cecil Rowell was born on 29th November 1892 in Wolborough, Newton Abbot, Devon. He was the youngest of three children to architectural surveyor Spencer Rowell and his wife, Annie.
The 1911 census recorded that William had left the family home to study to be a civil servant, and was boarding with a family in Fulham, London. His studies complete, he was driven by a need to serve his country and, on 22nd January 1913, aged just 20 years old, he enlisted in the Loyal North Lancashire Regiment.
Full details of his service are not available, but it is clear that he was committed to his purpose. He was promoted to Second Lieutenant soon after enlisting, rose to full Lieutenant in November 1914, and Captain a year later. It’s not possible to pinpoint where he served, he was wounded twice and, after his second recovery, he made a transfer to the Royal Flying Corps (later moving to the new Royal Air Force when it was founded in 1918).
Captain Rowell was based at Bekesbourne Airfield in Kent. He qualified as a pilot with 50 Squadron in October 1918, but was injured when, on the 12th November, his Sopwith Camel collided with the hanger. William was admitted to the Military Hospital in nearby Canterbury, but the injuries to his leg proved too severe for it to be saved, and he underwent an amputation in January 1919.
Tragically, while the initial prognosis was good, within a few weeks sepsis set in; Captain Rowell passed away on 22nd May 1919, aged just 26 years old.
William Cecil Rowell’s body was brought back to Devon for burial. He was laid to rest in the family plot in the graveyard of St Mary’s Church in Wolborough.
George Henry Woodland was born on 9th June 1899, and was one of six children – three boys and three girls – to Mark and Ada Woodland. Mark was a hewer in a coalmine in Radstock, Somerset, and this is where the family were raised.
George – who was better known as Harry – was still at school when war broke out. He had been taught at the Church of England School in his home town, before winning a scholarship to Shepton Mallet Grammar School. Having passed his exams there, he was taken on as a member of staff at his former school, before joining the army in June 1917 when he turned eighteen.
Initially joining the Infantry Training Reserve, Harry was subsequently transferred to the Royal Air Force. After training in Yorkshire for five months, he was transferred to the 52nd Training Depot Station at Cramlington Airfield in Northumberland.
Second Lieutenant Woodland returned home on leave in October 1918. This was the first time that he and his two brothers had been together since war had been declared – one had been serving in France, the other had been injured and was recuperating at a hospital in Bristol. Harry returned to Northumberland on 14th October.
On 5th November 1918, Harry was flying at the Cramlington base; shortly after take off, while carrying out a flat turn at a height of about 100ft, his aircraft stalled and nosedived, catching fire on impact. Tragically, Second Lieutenant Woodland and his passenger – Air Mechanic Ryder – were burnt to death. Harry was just 19 years of age.
George Henry “Harry” Woodland was brought back to Somerset for burial. He was laid to rest in the family plot in the graveyard of St Nicholas’ Church in his home town of Radstock.
Second Lieutenant George Woodland (from britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk)
Wallis Rowland Henry Rochfort-Davies was born August 1895, the youngest of two children to Reverend Charles Rochfort-Davies and his wife, Ethel. Charles was, for some time, the vicar at St Leonard’s Church in Shipham, Somerset, and both Wallis and his older sister Agnes, were both at school until at least their late teens.
Details of Wallis’ military service are scant. He enlisted in the Somerset Light Infantry, and was assigned to the 3rd (Reserve) Battalion, which was based initially in Taunton and then Devonport, near Plymouth.
Sadly, the next information available for Wallis relates to his death. A contemporary local newspaper initially.
It is reported that Sec.-Lieut. Wallis Rowland Henry Rochfort-Davies, 3rd (Reserve) Batt. Somerset LI, died on March 8th. He was the only son of Rev. CH Rochfort-Davies, of Shipham Rectory, Weston-super-Mare. Aged 20, he obtained his commission in Somerset LI in August 1914.
Western Morning News: Thursday 16 March 1916
No details of the cause of Wallis’ death were announced, but a post mortem and inquest were held, and the findings came out later that month.
At the Coroner’s Court yesterday afternoon, Mr AE Baker resumed the inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the death of Wallis Roland [sic] Henry Rochfort-Davies, aged 20, a Second Lieutenant in the Somerset Light Infantry. The inquest was opened on the 9th when evidence was given to the effect that deceased was found dead at the Royal Hotel on March 8. The adjournment was rendered necessary in order that the contents of the stomach might be analysed.
Mr Russell, the City Analyst, gave evidence as to the examination of the contents of the stomach. This showed the presence of morphia.
Dr PW White said he was called to the Royal Hotel about 3:30 in the afternoon of March 8. He found the deceased lying in bed, life being extinct. Death had take place probably 8 or 9 hours previously. There were no external marks of violence. The post mortem examination showed some congestion of the internal organs, but nothing to account for death. He had no hesitation in saying that the cause of death was morphia poisoning, probably hypodermically administered.
Charles Greenslade, a plain clothes officer, said he was called to the Royal Hotel on Wednesday 8 March about 4:30pm. Witness made an examination of the room. He found on the dressing table a case containing two small bottles: one was filled with morphia tablets and the other empty. There was also a blue bottle found, which contained a lotion. Needles and a hypodermic syringe were also found…
Reginald Francis Cheese, a friend of the deceased, said he had shown him some drugs on two occasions. He identified a case of drugs produced as having been shown him by the deceased.
The jury returned a verdict of “Death from an overdose of morphia, self-administered”. The expressed sympathy with the father of the deceased and desired to severely censure the witness Cheese.
The Coroner spoke of the increased habit of drug taking among officers, and of the amount of drugs which the case that had been produced contained. Deceased, he said, could not have purchased from any chemist such a quantity of drugs, and it must have got into his hands through the medium of a friend. It was a grossly wicked act that such a large quantity of drugs was ever allowed to get into the hands of this unfortunate young man.
Western Daily Press: Friday 31st March 1916
Wallis Rowland Henry Rochfort-Davies was just 20 years old when he died. He was laid to rest in the Milton Cemetery in Weston-super-Mare, in his home county of Somerset.
Harold Blake Hatcher was born on 11th February 1895, one of nine children to Robert Hatcher and his wife Ellen. Robert was a draper, and brought his family up in his home town of Taunton in Somerset. At least one of his children followed him into the cloth business, and, after he died in 1908, this seems to have fallen to Harold’s older brothers, Arthur and Ernest.
After leaving school, Harold became a dental student. Initially studying with Kendrick’s in his home town, he was about to begin training at Guy’s Hospital in London when war broke out.
Harold joined up in May 1915, and was initially assigned as a Lance Corporal to the 6th Battalion of the Somerset Light Infantry, before being transferred to the Middlesex Regiment.
In November 1917, he was badly injured in while fighting at Bourlon Woods, as part of the Battle of Cambrai. It was while he was recuperating that he transferred again, this time to the fledgling Royal Air Force.
Second Lieutenant Hatcher gained his wings in June 1918, and soon became a flying instructor. It was while he was working at RAF Fairlop in North West London, that an incident occurred. A local newspaper picked up the story.
Many in Taunton have learnt with sincere regret of the accidental death whilst flying of Lieutenant Harold Blake Hatcher of the Royal Air Force, third son of the late Mr Robert Hatcher of Taunton, and of Mrs Hatcher, now of Bristol.
The accident in which he met his death on Monday was a triple fatality, two other airmen being killed at the same time, Second Lieutenant Laurie Bell, of Bournemouth, and Flight Sergeant AR Bean, of Burslem.
At the inquest… it was stated in evidence that while Lieutenant Hatcher and Sergeant Bean were flying at a height of about 500ft, Second Lieutenant Bell, who w flying a single-seater, dived from a position some 700 feet higher, his machine striking and cutting clean through the double-seater, which folded its wings, hovered a few second, and then crashed to the earth. The three men were instantaneously killed.
A verdict of Accidental Death was returned.
Taunton Courier and Western Advertiser: Wednesday 7th August 1918
Further witness testimony described how the Sopwith Camel, piloted by Bell, cutting the AVRO airplane it in two. Hatcher fell out of the wrecked two-seater as the Camel’s wings slowly folded into a V and fluttered free following the fuselage to the ground. All three airmen lost their lives. Bean was found in a sitting position, still strapped in the front half of the AVRO’s fuselage, his instructor’s body was found unmarked thirty yards away in the grass where it had fallen. The wingless Camel crashed close by and Bell was found to have almost every bone in his body broken.
The accident took place on 30th July 1918. Second Lieutenant Hatcher was just 23 years old.
Harold Blake Hatcher lies at rest in St Mary’s Cemetery in his home town of Taunton, Somerset.
Arthur Webb Butler Bentley was born on 1st January 1884 to Dr Arthur Bentley and his wife Letitia. The oldest of five children, they were a well-travelled family. Dr Bentley had been born in Devon, but his and Letitia’s first two children were born in Singapore, while their second two were born in Ireland, where Letitia herself had been born.
By the time of the 1891 census, the family were living in Paddington, London, where Arthur’s father was a medical practitioner.
Arthur Jr looked set to follow in his father’s footsteps; becoming a student of medicine in Edinburgh, although it seems his life was destined to take a different route.
By 1905, his father was working at a practice in Egypt. It was around this time that his mother made the newspaper headlines.
VICTIM OF CHROLODYNE
A painful story was told at the Clerkenwell Sessions when Letitia Bentley, the wife of a doctor holding an official position in Cairo, pleaded guilty to the theft of a diamond and ruby ring from the shop of Messrs. Attenborough, Oxford Street [London]. It was stated that Mrs Bentley was addicted to the drinking of spirits and chlorodyne, and that 240 empty bottles which had contained the latter drug had been found in her rooms in Bloomsbury.
Dr Bentley said he would keep his wife under strict supervision in the future, and she was bound over.
Shetland Times: Saturday 3rd June 1905.
The ring concerned was valued at five guineas (around £700 in today’s money), and another report confirmed that her husband “supplied her with ample means” [financially].
In the 19th century, chlorodyne was readily used as a treatment for a number of medical conditions. Its principal ingredients were a mixture of laudanum (an alcoholic solution of opium), tincture of cannabis, and chloroform, it readily lived up to its claims of relieving pain and a sedative.
Letitia does not appear in any other contemporary media; sadly, however, she passed away “at sea” in June 1907, presumably on the way to or from Cairo, where Arthur Sr was still working. She was just 47 years old.
Arthur seems to have taken the decision to move away, and he emigrated to Canada, settling in Winnipeg. Leaving England behind, he left the idea of medicine with it, finding work as a lineman instead, constructing and maintaining telegraph and power lines.
Arthur’s father is the next member of the family to appear in the local newspapers. Working in Cairo during the winter and Llandrindod Wells in the summer, he travelled to Wales in April 1911. One evening he collapsed and died while in the smoking room of his hotel. The media reported that he was “formerly Colonial Surgeon to the Straits Civil Service, Singapore” and that “he was going to deliver a lecture at Owen’s College [now the Victoria College of Manchester] on tropical diseases, upon which he was an expert.“
Arthur Jr was now 27, and had lost both of his parents. War was on the horizon, though, and he seemed keen to become involved. He enlisted in December 1915, joining the Canadian Expeditionary Force. His sign-up papers gave him as just short of 32 years old, standing at 5ft 8ins (1.72m) tall, with a fair complexion, blue eyes and brown hair. The document also recorded his next of kin as his brother, William, who was living near Cairo.
Arthur arrived in England on 25th September 1916; during his time in the army he remained on English soil, primarily at a signal base in Seaford. Transferred to a reserve battalion in January 1917, he was eventually discharged seven months later.
His records suggest that his services were no longer required, but t is likely that Arthur’s discharge was his transfer to the Yorkshire Regiment, complete with a commission.
The now Second Lieutenant Bentley was assigned to the 3rd Special Reserve Battalion but never saw action in Europe. The troop’s main duties were to train men for service overseas and to provide coastal defences. While there is no confirmation of exactly where Arthur was based, there were units in and around Hartlepool, County Durham.
Sadly, there is little further information about Arthur. By the end of the war, he was living in Taunton, Somerset, where his younger sister Eileen had settled. Second Lieutenant Bentley survived the war, but passed away not long afterwards, on 2nd December 1918. There is no cause given for his death. He was just 35 years old.
Arthur Webb Butler Bentley lies at rest in St Mary’s Cemetery in Taunton, Somerset.
Archibald Charles Mark Walsh was born on 3rd February 1892, the youngest of three children to Henry Alfred Walsh and his wife Ann. Henry had a distinguished military career, and his sons – Archibald and his older brother Theobald – seemed destined to do the same.
Henry’s service took him around the world, and, by the time Archibald was born, the family had settled in Devon. In tracing the family’s life, however, an unusual quirk arises around the turn of the century.
In 1901, the majority of the Walsh family disappear from census records. For someone like Henry, this would not be unusual; his career took him overseas, and it is likely that records were lost or destroyed.
However, Archibald and his sister Gwladys do appear in the records. They are set up in a seafront villa in the Kent town of Hythe, Gwladys is listed as both a school pupil and the head of the household – at the age of 14 – and the two siblings are living there with a governess, Mary Porter.
By the time of the next census, Cadet Walsh had followed his father into the military. He was a student at the Military Academy in Woolwich, and the following year achieved his commission, becoming a Second Lieutenant in the Royal Horse Artillery.
When war broke out, Archibald’s regiment were shipped off to the Western Front. In March 1915, he was caught up in the Battle of Neuve Chapelle, and was badly wounded.
Shipped back to England for treatment, he was admitted to the Hall-Walker Hospital for Officers in Regents Park, London. Sadly, Second Lieutenant Walsh’s injuries were too severe, and he passed away on 18th March 1915. He was just 23 years old.
Brought back to Taunton, near his family home, Archibald Charles Mark Walsh lies at rest in St Mary’s Cemetery.
Arthur Llewellyn was born in the summer of 1873, one of four children to Evan and Mary Llewellyn. Originally from Wales, Evan was a Justice of the Peace in the Somerset village of Burrington, and the family lived in the comparative luxury of Langford Court, a mile or so from the village centre.
I use the term ‘comparative luxury’ with some sense of irony; according to the 1881 census, the family had a household staff of eight, including a governess, two nurses, housemaid, cook, kitchen maid, parlour maid and page.
Ambition was obviously what drove Evan; he was an army office, who served in initially in the Somerset Light Infantry. In 1885, he was elected MP for North Somerset, a position he held on and off for nearly twenty years. His military service continued, however, and he led the 2nd (Central African) Battalion, King’s African Rifles in the Boer War.
Comfort ran in the Llewellyn family; according to the 1891 census, Arthur was staying with his maternal aunt, Rose Stewart. She also lived in Somerset, and, at the time the census was drawn up, she was recorded as a widow living on her own means, with her mother, mother-in-law, two nieces and Arthur, her nephew. She was not without help, however, as the house had a retinue of eight staff to support her.
Military life was an obvious draw for Arthur. He enlisted in the Somerset Light Infantry in October 1891 and, within a year, had been promoted to Second Lieutenant.
He had met and married Meriel Byrne, in 1895. The couple’s marriage certificate confirms that he had been promoted to Captain in the militia, and his residence was Buckingham Palace Road, in south west London. They were married in Holy Trinity Church, Brompton, with Meriel’s mother and Arthur’s father acting as witnesses.
The couple went on to have five children, all girls, and they settled into a comfortable life. By 1901, Meriel had set up home in Worcestershire; Arthur does not appear on that year’s census, which suggests that he may too have been fighting in South Africa.
Arthur’s mother Mary passed away in 1906, at the tender age of 39. By 1911, he had been promoted to Lieutenant Colonel in the 3rd Somerset Light Infantry, and was head of his household in Worcestershire. The family was, by this time, complete – Arthur and Meriel and their five children also had help running their home, with two nurses, a cook, parlour maid and housemaid to support them.
Evan passed away months before war was declared, at the age of 67. Lieutenant Colonel Llewellyn felt duty bound to re-enlist, and was given command of the 3rd Reserve Battalion, Somerset Light Infantry. He subsequently served as part of the Army Service Corps in France, before transferring to the Army Labour Corps in Nottingham.
According to the Evening Mail, on 27th April 1920, he “was suddenly seized with illness in the street, and died as he was being conveyed to Nottingham Hospital. He was 46 years of age.”
Arthur was brought back to Burrington in Somerset, where he was buried alongside his parents in Holy Trinity Churchyard.
Sadly, Meriel passed away nine months after her husband; she too is buried in Holy Trinity Churchyard.
Arthur’s estate passed to his brother, Owen, and totalled £12,023 15s 11d (approximately £530,000 in today’s money).
As an aside to Arthur’s illustrious story, another of his brothers is worthy of note. Hoel Llewellyn was two years older than Arthur.
Educated for the Royal Navy, he saw active service on the East Coast of Africa, 1888-90 with despatches. He also served as Artillery Officer and commanded artillery in the Matabele War, where he was recommended for the Victoria Cross. He was promoted Captain in the British South Africa Police, and Justice of the Peace in Matabeleland in1896.
Captain Llewellyn served throughout the South African War; commanding armoured trains north of Mafeking before transferring to the South African Constabulary in 1901. Hoel was eventually created a Companion of the Distinguished Service Order for his service in South Africa.
He was wounded while serving with the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force in the Great War. Hoel was subsequently promoted to the rank of Colonel and appointed Provost-Marshal of Egypt and the British Mediterranean Expeditionary Force.
In 1908, he had been made Chief Constable of Wiltshire, a role he was to hold for 37 years. He was key to pioneering the use of police dogs, and went on to become the oldest serving person to hold the Chief Constable role in the county.
Evan Henry Llewellyn
Another aspect of the Llewellyn family is that Evan was obviously a source of political drive for the family; his great-great-grandson is David Cameron, UK Prime Minister from 2010 to 2016.
Francis Llewellyn Cowley – also known as ‘Frank’ was born in July 1877 on the Isle of Man. He was one of ten children to Thomas and Ann Cowley, farmers who owned 133 acres on the northern tip of the island.
Frank’s trail goes cold for a few years; he was still living on his father’s farm in 1891, but by 1913, had moved to to the mainland, settling in Kent.
It was here, in Gillingham, that Frank married Lily Matilda Carrington in the summer of 1913. Sadly there is little information about Lily, but the couple do not appear to have had any children.
Frank enlisted shortly after war broke out; he joined the Royal Engineers on 27th October 1914, and within a couple of years has reached the rank of 2nd Lieutenant.
Sadly again at this point Frank’s trail goes cold. He next appears in a newspaper article from 1st March 1919, when he is listed as having attended the funeral in Rainham, Kent, of Air Mechanic Herbert Holdstock. He is now listed as Captain F Cowley RE.
That was resolved to be a tantalising glimpse into Captain Cowley’s final few weeks. From this point, all the documents tell us is that he worked at the School of Military Engineering in Chatham.
Frank passed away on 18th March 1919, although no cause of death is recorded. He was 41 years old.
Francis Llewellyn Cowley lies at rest in the Woodlands Cemetery close to his home in Gillingham, Kent.
William James Bradbeer was born in the spring of 1888, the youngest of eight children to Alfred and Jane Bradbeer from Bridgwater in Somerset. Alfred was a carriage trimmer, fitting out the train coaches for the local railways.
Sadly, William lost both of his parents in 1910; by this point he was 22, and was working as a schoolmaster along with his older brother Alfred. Five of the Bradbeer siblings were living together by this point, along with Sidney Palfrey, a photographer, who was boarding with them.
On 27th December 1911, William married Selina Nurse, who was also from Bridgwater, and whose father was a master mariner. The couple did not have any children together.
There is little evidence of William’s life after his marriage. He was enlisted in the Royal Garrison Artillery during the war, although no details of his military service are available. The battalions provided support in key forts primarily along the south coast of England, but also in places like the Channel Isles, Malta and Sierra Leone. Without Second Lieutenant Bradbeer’s records, it is impossible to know specifically where he served, but it would seem likely that he remained in England during the war.
The last years of William’s are also shrouded in mystery; he passed away on 8th August 1920, at the age of 32. I have been unable to uncover a cause of death, but it seems likely to have been an illness, as there is nothing in the contemporary media to suggest anything unusual or untoward.
William James Bradbeer lies at rest in the Wembdon Road Cemetery in his home town of Bridgwater. Sadly, though, his grave is also lost to time, and I was unable to pinpoint its location. In death, as in his later years, William remains a mystery.
Note: The grave at the top of this page, however, is of a couple of his Bradbeer relatives, buried in the same cemetery.
Death and Service 