Two local men from Knowle died in France on 4th October 1916, whilst serving with the 7th Battalion Queen’s Own (Royal West Kent Regiment). The men – 35-year-old Lance Corporal William Abraham John Bird and 29-year-old Private George Samuel Thompson were friends and had sung together in the choir at Knowle parish church. They were killed by the same shell.
22nd September 1916
23-year-old Private Job William Mason, 3rd Battalion Coldstream Guards, died of wounds on 22nd September 1916 at No. 1 South African General Hospital, Abbeville, France. The hospital had begun admitting patients on 17th July 1916, although it was staffed by temporary nursing staff from the adjacent No. 2 Stationary Hospital until the arrival on 4th August of a Matron and nurses from England. See the Scarlet Finders website for more information on the S.A.G. Hospital, Abbeville.
16th September 1916
Two local men lost their lives on active service on 16th September 1916 – 41-year-old Private Alexander Arthur Astle, 14th Battalion, Hampshire Regiment and 23-year-old Company Sergeant Major Arthur Eric Townley, 7th Battalion, King’s Royal Rifle Corps.
4th September 1916
John Howard Cotterell was killed on 4th September 1916 serving as a Lance Corporal with the 2nd Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment. He has no known grave and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial. He was born in Chessetts Wood, Knowle in 1882 and was the youngest of the seven children (five sons, two daughters) born to parents Edward (a gardener) and Alice (née Clark) who had married at Knowle in November 1871.
29th August 1916
36-year-old Private Thomas Walter Haynes, 4th Battalion King’s (Liverpool) Regiment, and 22-year-old Corporal Horace Timmins, 15th Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment (1st Birmingham Pals) both died on 29th August 1916.
Both men were born in Birmingham, although Thomas Haynes was living in Knowle before joining the Army. Horace Timmins’ local connection is that he spent time living at Marston Green Cottage Homes where his mother, Emma, was a foster mother.
27th August 1916
Lance Corporal Frederick Edwin Hollis, ‘C’ Company, 1st/8th Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment was born in Packwood in 1890 and died on 27th August 1916.
He was initially reported missing, and there was an announcement in Knowle parish magazine in August 1917 suggesting he was a prisoner of war. In fact, he had been killed on 27th August 1916 in the attack on the German “Constance trench” (so named by Australian troops), which ran near Mouquet Farm (apparently known to the British as “Mucky Farm” and to the Australians as “Moo-cow Farm”). The farm was completely destroyed by three weeks of fighting and had to be completely rebuilt after the war.
Zero-hour on 27th August was 7pm, when the field artillery would commence an intense shrapnel barrage on the front of the attack, and ‘C’ and ‘D’ companies mounting ladders from their trench, advancing up to the barrage. At zero plus five, the barrage would lift to allow the leading wave to enter the enemy trenches. The Battalion War Diary reports that ‘C’ Company reached its objective but was heavily bombed and forced to retire, suffering heavy losses in the process. (Information from unpublished research by the late Alan Tucker).
20th August 1916
31-year-old Private Alfred Knibb was killed in action on 20th August 1916 serving with the 1st/9th Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment. He was born in 1885 in the parish of Tanworth-in-Arden and was the 9th child and youngest son of parents Edwin and Ellen (née Keen). The couple had married in 1867 in Knowle and went on to have 12 children, of whom 11 (five sons, six daughters) were still living by the time of the 1911 census.
14th August 1916
Stanley Theodore Pryce was killed on 14th August 1916, serving as a Rifleman with the 12th Battalion Rifle Brigade. Born in Knowle on 15th July 1893, and baptised at Knowle parish church the following month, he was the ninth of 12 children born to parents John (a coachman) and Marie (née Dieudonné). Marie was a French national, who was born in Carentan in Normandy. It’s not known when she moved to England but she and John married in Oswestry in 1879, when they were both aged 21.
1st August 1916
23-year-old Reginald Milnes Blakemore died of wounds at no. 36 Casualty Clearing Station, France on 1st August 1916, whilst serving as a Private with the Royal Warwickshire Regiment. He was born in Knowle on 8th August 1893 and was the third of the four children (three sons, one daughter) of parents George and Catherine. The couple’s three sons were all given Catherine’s maiden name, Milnes, as their middle name.
27th July 1916
18-year-old Private Clarence Alfred Sinclair Smith died on 27th July 1916, serving as a Private with “B” Company, 16th Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment. He was born in Knowle on 27th June 1898, and baptised at Knowle parish church on 14th August 1898. His father, Alfred, was listed as an insurance agent and the family was living at Kenilworth Road, Knowle.
Solihull Life 