35-year-old Private Edwin Guy Silk was killed in action on 20th September 1918 whilst serving with the 14th Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment. Edwin was the youngest of the five known children of parents Edwin (a coal merchant) and Eleanor Maria (née Prosser) who had married in Coleshill in 1875. A sixth child had died in infancy.
27th August 1918
Private William Thompson Walters, 7th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers died on 27th August 1918, aged 20. Born in Solihull on 15th November 1897, he was the second of the five children of parents George Alfred Walters and Alice Robbins (née Thompson) who had married at St Alphege Church, Solihull in 1894. The couple had two sons and three daughters.
11th August 1918
19-year-old Lieutenant Harry Fawdry, Royal Air Force, was killed in action on 11th August 1918 when his aeroplane (DH9 serial number C1207) was hit by anti-aircraft fire over Zeebrugge. He was born in Sutton Coldfield in 1899, and was the eldest of the two sons of parents, Harry and Winifred Annie (née Hammersley). The couple had married at Bordesley, Birmingham in 1897 and were living at The Parade, Sutton Coldfield at the time of their eldest son’s baptism in October 1899.
21st July 1918
Lieutenant Philip Edward Lindner, aged 30, was killed on 21st July 1918 whilst flying with 66th Wing, Royal Air Force in Albania. Born in Solihull on 4th April 1889, he was the youngest of the seven children of parents, Frederick William Lindner (an export merchant) and his wife Lucy Jane (née Collins) who had married in Coventry in 1876.
20th July 1918
Two men with a local connection lost their lives on active service on 20th July 1918. Captain Robert Jacobs, commanding No. 8 Sanitary Section, Royal Army Medical Corps, died of wounds, aged 39, after an enemy bomb fell on his billet. Second Lieutenant Norman Edward Smith, 1st/2nd Battalion Lancashire Fusiliers, attached to 2nd/4th Battalion Hampshire Regiment, was killed in action, aged 28.
16th July 1918
Two men with a local connection lost their lives on 16th July 1918 whilst on active service – Private Percy Farmer Draycott, Royal Army Service Corps and Private Charles Henry Hiles, 18th Battalion, Lancashire Fusiliers.
2nd July 1938 – opening of Brueton Gardens
The official opening of Brueton Gardens on the corner of Warwick Road and Lode Lane, Solihull took place at 11am on 2nd July 1938.
The land, opposite Poplar Road, had previously been occupied by a house called The Poplars, which had been home to Doris Hamilton-Smith, an artist and pupil of Edith Holden (the “Edwardian Lady” whose nature diary was posthumously published in 1977).
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28 June 1968 – Solihull’s first Conservation Areas
The first two Conservation Areas in Solihull – the centres of Solihull and Knowle – were declared as such on 28th June 1968, with a declaration appearing in the London Gazette, 2nd July 1968.
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28th June 1918
Three men with a local connection lost their lives on active service on 28th June 1918:
- Private Harry Cross, 1st Battalion, Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry
- Private Robert Henry Smith, 15th Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment
- Private George Henry Taylor, 12th Battalion, Hampshire Regiment
20th May 1918
25-year-old Corporal William Reginald Finley, 1st Life Guards, died of wounds on 20th May 1918 after being injured by an aerial bomb some days before. Born in Bentley Heath, Solihull in 1892, he was the only son of parents William Robert and Elizabeth (née Ravenhill) who had married in Aston in 1889. The couple also had four daughters.
Solihull Life 