Private Alfred Stevens MM, 99th Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps, died of his wounds at Keighley War Hospital on 30th April 1918, having been invalided to the UK. Born in Shirley in 1889, Alfred became a clerk with the Britannic Assurance company.
28th April 1918
Rifleman Thomas Clifford Williams died of wounds on 28th April 1918 whilst serving with the London Regiment (Queen Victoria’s Rifles). He was 27 years old and was born in Solihull in 1890.
26th April 1918
Private Herbert Frank Crofts died of wounds on 26th April 1918 whilst serving with the 2nd Battalion Devonshire Regiment. He was 19 years old.
25th April 1918
23-year-old Second Lieutenant Arthur George Ansell, 1st Field Survey Company, Royal Engineers, died of gas poisoning in No. 8 Red Cross Hospital, Boulogne, France on 25th April 1918, after being gassed at Passchendaele. He was the eldest of the three children of parents Arthur John (an agent for the Prudential Assurance Company at Solihull) and Emma (née Lynes) who had married in Notting Hill in 1893. Arthur John Ansell was a widower – his first wife, Kate Purvey (1867-1892) had died in childbirth in 1892, after just one year of marriage.
24th April 1918
Two local men lost their lives on 24th April 1918 whilst on active service – Corporal William Henry Harrison, 1st Battalion Cheshire Regiment, and Private Arthur Ronald Prentice, 14th Battalion, Gloucestershire Regiment.
22nd April 1918
Major Frank Northey Harston MC was killed in action on 22nd April 1918 serving with the 11th Brigade, East Lancashire Regiment. He was born in Blatchinworth, Rochdale, Lancashire in 1890 and was the second of the three sons of parents John Edwin (HM Inspector of Factories) and Bessie Anne Northey (née Plucknett) who had married in Devon in 1886. The youngest son, Lionel Brunyee Harston (1893-1894), died as an infant.
20th April 1918
Two local men lost their lives on 20th April 1918 whilst on active service in France – 20-year-old Private James Franklin, 10th Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment and 21-year-old Second Lieutenant Frederick Harold Hoyle of 2nd Battalion, West Yorkshire Regiment (Prince of Wales’s Own).
18th April 1918
Private George Edward Houlston died of wounds on 18th April 1918 whilst serving in France with the 4th Battalion Machine Gun Corps. He was 20 years old and was born in Solihull in 1897.
16th April 1918
Two local men lost their lives on 16th April 1918 whilst on active service – Private Jim Birch, 5th Battalion, Tank Corps, and Lance Corporal Harry Moseley, 1st Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment.
15th April 1918
Private Richard Bradburn, 1st Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment, was killed in action on 15th April 1918. He was the first of two brothers to be killed, as his younger brother, Harry Matthew Bradburn, died on 23rd October 1918.
Solihull Life 