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Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, illness, photography, Rifle Brigade, Second Lieutenant, Somerset, story, war

Second Lieutenant George Palmer

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Second Lieutenant George Palmer

George Henry Palmer is one of those names that has been a challenge to research and who risked being lost to time.

George and Henry are common names for the late Victorian era, so a simple search on Ancestry brought up too many options to confirm anything specific.

Given the ornate nature of his headstone, it seemed reasonable that his passing and funeral would have been recorded in contemporary media, and indeed it was; the only identifiable name was his own. (His parents “WR and A Palmer” and featured, as is his grandfather “Rev. J Palmer”, but, again, this is not enough to go on for research.)

The additional name on the gravestone, however – George’s brother Albert – proved to be the key, though, identifying the following.

George Henry Palmer was born in May 1896, one of five children to William Richard Palmer and his wife Amy. William was a chemist’s assistant, a job that seemed to move him around the country. William was born in Wells, Somerset, as was his wife and eldest son; George was born in Regents Park, London, while Albert, who was a year younger, was born back in Wells. By the time of the 1901 census (when George was 4 and Albert 3), the family were living in Leicester, and they remained so for the next ten years.

Details of George’s military service comes primarily from the newspaper report of his funeral:

Deceased… was discharged from the Army through wounds received at Ypres in February, 1916, and had resumed his studies at Oxford and entered on a course of forestry, which he was following with great success.

He was well known in Wells, having spent a considerable time in the city and vicinity. He took a great interest in the Wells Volunteers, and was able to drill them in true Army style, having received his training in the Artist Rifles, and later gained his commission in the Rifle Brigade, where he was spoken highly of by his brother officers and men.

Mr Palmer was most thorough and painstaking in all his duties and studies. He was a Wyggestine [sic] scholar at the age of ten years in open competition, and later senior scholar at Wadham College Oxford.

Wells Journal: Friday 1st November 1918.

Second Lieutenant Palmer contracted pneumonia while up at Oxford, succumbing to the illness on 28th October 1918, just a fortnight before the end of the war. He was 22 years of age.

George Henry Palmer lies at rest in the cemetery of his home city of Wells.

Commonwealth War Graves, Cook's Mate, Great War, Hampshire, history, injury, Kent, photography, Royal Navy, Somerset, story, war

Cook’s Mate Harry King

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Cook’s Mate Harry King

Harry George King was born in Somerset in December 1894, one of nine children to John and Sarah King. John worked as a cabinet maker in Wells, and Harry followed in a similar vein to his father, becoming an upholsterer.

When war broke out, Harry – who stood at 5’3″ (1.6m) tall – enlisted in the Royal Navy as a Cook’s Mate. He trained on HMS Victory I in Portsmouth, before transferring to the HMV Vernon, a land-based ship, also in Portsmouth.

While on leave in 1917, Harry married Alice Trickey, who had also been born in Wells.

Harry’s first sea-going assignment was on the HMS Hermione, which was a guard ship off the Southampton coast. After two years on board, Cook’s Mate King was transferred to another vessel.

The HMS Glatton was a monitor vessel requisitioned by the Royal Navy from the Norwegian fleet at the outbreak of the First World War. After a lengthy refit, she was finally ready for service in the autumn of 1918, and positioned in Dover in preparation for a future offensive across the Channel.

At 6:15 on the evening of 16 September, there was a small explosion in a 6-inch magazine below decks, which then ignited the cordite stored there. Flames shot through the roof of one of the turrets and started to spread. The fire was not able to be brought under control, and there were concerns that, if the ship’s rear magazine exploded, the presence of the ammunition ship Gransha only 150 yards (140 m) away risked a massive explosion that would devastate Dover itself. The decision was taken to torpedo the Glatton, in the hope that the incoming flood water would quash the fire.

In the event, sixty men aboard the Glatton were killed outright, with another 124 men injured, of whom 19 died later of their injuries. This included Cook’s Mate King.

While the incident wasn’t reported in the media of the time, Harry’s funeral was; it gives a little more insight into the tragedy.

News reached Wells… that 1st Class Cook’s Mate Harry George King… was lying in a hospital at Dover suffering from severe burns caused through an internal explosion on the ship on which he was serving. His wife (…to whom he was married 12 months ago) and his sister at once proceeded to the hospital, where they arrived only a few minutes before he died.

The unfortunate young man had sustained shocking injuries and was conscious for only two hours on Friday. He lost all his belongings in the explosion.

Wells Journal: Friday 27th September 1918.

Harry George King was only 27 years old when he died. He lies at rest in Wells Cemetery, Somerset.

Harry’s widow, Alice, did not remarry; the couple had not had any children, and she passed away in their home town of Wells, in January 1974.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, illness, Lieutenant, Middlesex Yeomanry, North Somerset Yeomanry, photography, Royal Army Service Corps, Somerset, story, war

Lieutenant Stanley Russ

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Lieutenant Stanley Russ

Stanley Hugh Russ was born in 1888, the youngest of five children to Alfred and Elizabeth. The family lived in Wells, Somerset, where Alfred worked as Clerk to the Guardians of the local workhouse. They were doing well for themselves, as they had two domestic servants at the time of the 1891 census.

Stanley seems to have been a studious young man, and by 1911 was boarding in London, where he was a dental student.

Details of Stanley’s military service are scant, but he obviously did well at his job, and rose to the rank of Lieutenant. The local newspaper gave a good overview of his life when reporting on his funeral:

The deceased gentleman was a dentist by profession, and served his apprenticeship with Mr Goddard of Wells. He afterwards went to London, where for some years he had been following his profession at Guy’s Hospital.

At the outbreak of was he joined the Middlesex Yeomanry as a trooper. He was later given a commission in the same regiment… After much service in France, he was, by reason of a physical disability incurred whilst on service, transferred to the Royal Army Service Corps (Mechanical Transport).

He again went to France and was attached to the North Somerset Yeomanry. He was invalided home, but went out a third time, being attached to a Canadian Siege Battery. He took part in the great push around Arras and Vimy Ridge.

He returned to England in October 1918, suffering from heart trouble, severe shell shock, and slight gassing. He was discharged from hospital in January 1919 and demobilised in the following March.

His health gave way, and he was subsequently operated on by a Harley Street specialist. He derived little benefit, and was afterwards removed to a nursing home, where he died.

The deceased gentleman, who was unmarried, was of a very bright and happy disposition, and enjoyed a wide circle of friends.

Wells Journal: Friday 5th November 1920

Stanley Hugh Russ died on 28th October 1920. He was 32 years old. He lies at rest in the cemetery of his home city of Wells.

Commonwealth War Graves, Corporal, Great War, history, illness, Private, Royal Field Artillery, Somerset, story, war

Corporal William Stevens

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Corporal William Stevens

William Charles Stevens was born in Wells in 1884. The eldest child of Alfred and Susan, William was one of eleven children. Alfred worked at the local paper mill, while William became a labourer, and found work as a stonemason.

William seemed keen to improve his prospects, however; he enlisted in the army at the start of 1903, serving in the Royal Field Artillery for a period of four years, before being demobbed to the reserves.

On Christmas Day 1907, William married Minnie Bailey; the census four years later gives the young couple as living in their home city. William, by now, was labouring on the railway, and the census shows, they had had a child, who had sadly passed away.

War was looming, and Gunner Stevens was recalled to duty in August 1914. Quickly posted overseas with the 23rd Brigade, he fell ill with myalgia and was shipped home to recover towards the end of the year.

Sent back to the front in 1915, William was promoted to Corporal and transferred to the 51st (Howitzer) Brigade. Sadly, his ‘tremble’ returned and he was sent back to England in October 1915. By this point, Minnie had given birth to their second child, a little girl they called Lilian.

Corporal Stevens’ condition continued, and he was medically discharged in March 1916. No further records exist, but it seems that he finally succumbed to the condition later that year. He passed away on 2nd November 1916, aged 32 years old.

William Charles Stevens lies at peace in the cemetery of his home town, Wells in Somerset.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, illness, photography, Private, Role, Royal West Surrey Regiment, Somerset, story, war

Private Arthur Vernoum

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Private Arthur Vernoum

Arthur Edward Vernoum was born in 1874, the second of seven children to David and Sabina Vernoum. David worked on the railways, while Arthur went into labouring, as a stonemason.

He married Elizabeth Parker in 1896, and the couple settled in Wells, Somerset. They had four children – William, Samuel, Richard and Winifred.

Arthur’s military service records are a bit scarce; he enlisted in the Royal West Surrey Regiment (The Queen’s). Given his age – he was 40 when war broke out – if is likely that this was towards the end of the conflict.

While is troop served in many of the key battles of the Great War, there is no evidence whether Private Vernoum was involved – again, because of his age, it may well have been that he served as part of a territorial, rather than European force.

Arthur’s pension records show that he passed away on 14th April 1920, of a carcinoma of the tongue and a haemorrhage. He was 46 years old.

Arthur Edward Vernoum lies at rest in the cemetery of his home town, Wells in Somerset.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, Gunner, history, illness, photography, Royal Horse Artillery, Somerset, Somerset Royal Horse Artillery, story, war

Gunner Alfred Richards

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Gunner Alfred Richards

Alfred Henry Richards was born in 1891, the oldest of five children to William Henry Richards and his wife Jane. William (who was known as Henry) worked in the local paper mill, and this is a trade that his two sons – Alfred and Leslie – were to follow as well.

Paper making was a driving force in this part of Somerset during the Victorian era, employing a large number of people in Wells and the nearby village of Wookey, which is where Alfred and his siblings were born.

Details of Alfred’s military service are sketchy. He enlisted as a Gunner in the Royal Horse Artillery, although when during the war this happened is unknown.

His troop – the 18th Brigade, 1st Somerset Royal Horse Artillery – was stationed in the UK for the first couple of years of the war, before serving in the Middle East. Again, I have not been able to confirm how much of this service Gunner Richards was involved in.

Alfred returned to Somerset after being demobbed, but within a few months of the end of the war, he succumbed to double pneumonia. He passed away on 1st March 1919, aged just 28 years old.

Alfred Henry Richards lies at rest in the cemetery in Wells, Somerset, not far from his home.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, illness, photography, Private, Royal Army Service Corps, Somerset, story, war

Private Francis Smith

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Private Francis Smith

Francis George Smith was born in Glasgow in 1890. Records are scattered, but some of the pieces pull together to give an outline of his life.

The son of William and Mary Smith, Francis was the fourth of six children. His tombstone confirms that William had worked as an optician, but passed away when Francis was a young man.

Francis was an electrical engineer, and had assisted Mary in her business in Glasgow before signing up.

Private Smith enlisted early on in the war, “on February 24th of this year [1915], when he left his native city for London, where he joined the motor transport section of the Army Service Corps” [Wells Journal, Friday 12th March 1915].

Billeted in Wells, he had been assigned to the 133 Mechanical Transport Company. Within weeks of moving there, however, it seems that Francis fell ill. Sadly, his was a life cut too short, and he passed away from pneumonia on 6th March 1915, aged just 25 years old.

Francis George Smith lies at rest in the cemetery in Wells.

Commonwealth War Graves, Cumbria, Great War, history, illness, photography, Royal Army Service Corps, Sergeant, Somerset, story, Sussex, war

Serjeant William Waterhouse

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Serjeant William Waterhouse

William James Waterhouse was born in 1875, the eldest of seven children to Richard and Elizabeth Waterhouse. The family lived in Cumberland, where Richard initially worked a grocer before becoming a music teacher.

William followed his father into food retail, working initially as a butcher’s boy in Barrow-in-Furness, before moving 400 miles to the south coast and settling in Eastbourne. Travel was definitely on William’s mind, however, as, by the 1911 census, he was a butcher’s manager at a hotel in Leicester.

William’s service records are limited; he was 39 when war broke out, and enlisted in the Eastern Mounted Brigade, before transferring Army Service Corps. During his time, he was promoted to Serjeant, and according to a newspaper report of his funeral “was most popular among the men.” [Wells Journal: Friday 9th July 1915]

It seems that, as part of his service, Serjeant Waterhouse had been assisting with haymaking in the Wells area, and it was after this that he fell ill. He developed pneumonia, and passed away on 30th June 1915. He 40 years old.

William James Waterhouse lies at rest in the cemetery of his adopted home town of Wells, in Somerset.

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

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.

Commonwealth War Graves, Great War, history, injury, Lieutenant, London Cyclist Corps, London Regiment, photography, Royal Air Force, Somerset, story, war

Flight Lieutenant Ronald Knight

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Flight Lieutenant Ronald Knight

Ronald Victor Knight was born in March 1894, the youngest of two children – both sons – to John Knight, an Ironmonger from London, and his Swiss wife, Marie.

Ronald was well educated – being taught at Wells and Bedford Grammar Schools in the UK and Neuchatel in Switzerland, not far from where his mother was born. After studying at Bristol University, he went to work at Guys Hospital in London, training as a dental student.

When war broke out, he volunteered at once, being enlisted in the 8th Battalion London Regiment. Lieutenant Knight went with his regiment to France, and was involved in the Battle of Festubert and the fighting at Loos.

Returning home towards the end of 1915, Ronald married Gwendoline Dawkes, in a ceremony overseen by the Bishop of Bath & Wells.

Rather than returning to the front line, Lieutenant Knight accepted a commission to lead a section of the London Cyclist Corps, a position he held for a year or do. While in this service, Ronald and Gwendoline had their one and only child, a little girl they called Beryl.

In 1916, Ronald accepted a further move to the Royal Naval Air Service, becoming involved in flying as a Flight Lieutenant. It was while he was based at RNAS Cranwell that he was involved in the accident that led to his death.

An inquest was held into the incident, and evidence was taken.

Air Mechanic Charles Deboo [said] that the machine had been recently inspected, and that it was alright. He did not see the deceased flying, but saw the machine come down, nose first, in corkscrew fashion. He saw it at a height of 400ft. He went to the machine after it had fallen and found the officer was dead. The machine struck the ground and smashed up, but he could not say how the accident happened.

Charles Barrett, air mechanic, said he saw the accident. The deceased seemed as if he was going to turn towards the wind to land, and, as he turned, he banked, but he never righted himself. He nose-dived and spun round to the earth. He thought he lost control as he was turning, or the wind might have caught him. The machine was smashed, except for the tail.

The jury returned a verdict that deceased accidentally met his death while flying.

Retford and Workshop Herald and North Notts Advertiser: Tuesday 20th March 1917.

Flight Lieutenant Knight died in an aeroplane crash on 12th March 1917. He was 22 years old.

Ronald Victor Knight lies at rest in Wells Cemetery, Somerset.

Sadly, Ronald’s daughter, Beryl, died in the spring of 1923, when she was only 7 years old. She is buried with her father.

Gwendoline went on to marry Henri Booth in months after the death of her daughter. The couple went on to have two children, Elizabeth and William. She requested that her late husband’s war medals be given to his father, John.