Private John Marshall was killed in action on 30th April, serving with 1st Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment. He was born in Ettington, Stratford-upon-Avon in 1895 and was the youngest of the three sons of John Henry Marshall (a labourer) and his wife, Alice (née Mumford) who had married at Ettington on 25th July 1885. John Henry Marshall died in Ettington in 1933, aged 72. Tragically, his two youngest sons pre-deceased him.
His youngest son, John, was hit by a shell and killed in action at the Battle of St Julien, France on 30th April (although Knowle Parish Magazine apparently gives the date as 28th April). He is buried at Bienvillers Military Cemetery.
His brother, Henry Marshall, died in August 1910 in an accident at work whilst still a teenager. The 17-year-old youth was working as a pony driver for Messrs Greaves, Bull and Lakin’s lime works at Goldicote, midway between Stratford-on-Avon and Ettington. He and a 15-year-old boy were taking an empty truck from a siding when they noticed a train approaching. The boys tried to stop their truck and release the ponies pulling it, but Henry was struck by the engine and suffered a fractured skull amongst other fatal injuries. The 1911 census, taken just a few months later, shows that John Henry Marshall and his youngest son, John, were still in Ettington. However, although John Henry was listed as married rather than widowed, we haven’t been able to find his wife on the 1911 census, nor his eldest son, William.
Members of Dene Valley U3A have done research into those, including John Marshall, commemorated on the Ettington War Memorial. John’s connection with Knowle isn’t known, but he is listed as being resident in the parish at the time of enlistment into the Army and he is commemorated in the Soldiers’ Chapel at Knowle parish church. His mother, Alice, was also in service at Elves Green in 1881 when she was 17, working as a general domestic servant to farmer Thomas Glover.
If you have any further information, please let us know.
Tracey
Heritage & Local Studies Librarian
tel.: 021 704 6934
email: heritage@solihull.gov.uk
Solihull Life 
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