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22859 Pnr William George Pink, 26 Field Company, Royal Engineers

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Arrived overseas: 17 August 1914. Connection: Interviewed in 1981. I met William Pink on 1st October 1981 when I was 19-years-old and he was 86. At that time, he was one of a dwindling band of Chelmsford Old Contemptibles, although he was originally from Hampshire and had been born in Southampton on the 10th December 1895. Prior to enlisting on 10th May 1912, he had worked as a groom. I took out my note pad and jotted down what he told me. "When war was declared we were immediately shipped over to Boulogne and went straight to Mons from there. There was a lot of troop movement all sorting themselves out because the Germans were heading straight for the Belgian Front. I fought at First Ypres and then la Bassee and there was no sign of an armistice although everyone expected the war to be over within a few weeks. "All of a sudden we were retreating and the might of the German Army was just behind us. We were impeded by the Belgian refugees fleeing in front of us; famili...
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3/10006 Sgt John Lee, 2nd Duke of Wellington's (West Riding Regiment)

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Arrived overseas: 26 August 1914. Connection: PoW postcards. 3/10006 Sergeant John Thomas Lee of the 2nd Duke of Wellington's (West Riding Regiment), could never have imagined, in all probability, that he would end up in a German prisoner of war camp. Born on the 29th October 1876 he had already served for 12 years with the West Riding Regiment, joining the regiment on the 20th November 1895 and seeing service with it in Malta and India. Completing his 12 years' service in 1907, he then re-engaged for a further four years as a Section D reservist. This took him up to the 24th June 1912 at which point he decided that he would join the Special Reserve. Nine days later he duly did so, signing up for six years' home service, albeit with the obligation to serve with the regular battalions if called upon to do so. That call up in 1914 must have been almost immediate because by the 26th August, John Lee was in France as part of a draft for the 2nd Battalion, serving with it until ...
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7683 Drummer Asher Hurrell, 2nd Suffolk Regiment

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Arrived overseas: 15 August 1914. Connection: PoW postcard 7683 Drummer Asher John Grey Hurrell of the 2nd Suffolk Regiment sent this card from Dyrotz camp in 1917, noting on the front that is was from "Friend Asher" lest the lady he sent it to, Miss Ivy Naylor, should think otherwise. A career soldier, he had been in France for precisely 12 days before he was captured at Le Cateau on the 26th August 1914, one of over 700 casualties sustained by the battalion that day, with many of those men taken prisoner. News about his capture was obviously slow to filter back to the UK, because on the 29th October, his worried mother asked for a letter to be published in the Stowmarket Post, asking for news of him. Eliza Hurrell wrote, "I have been informed by the War Office that my son, Drummer Asher Hurrell, No 7683, has been missing since the action at Le Cateau on the 26th August. I should be greatly obliged if you would give publicity to this in your columns as it might possibly...
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11355 Pte John Jarvis Brunt, Coldstream Guards

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  Arrived Overseas: 22 December 1914. Connection: Memorial scroll, photo, grave photo. John Jarvis Brunt enlisted with the Coldstream Guards on the 2nd September 1914 and by the 22nd December that year he was disembarking in France. He served with the regiment until commissioned on the 31st July 1917 when he joined the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers. He served with the 12th Battalion but was attached to the 10th Battalion when he was reported missing in action on the 24th March 1918. Later confirmed as killed in action on that date, he was buried in Villers Bretonneux Military Cemetery (XVI B 1). John Brunt was the son of Mr and Mrs James Brunt of 47 Rockley Road, Hillsborough, Sheffield and was 29 years old at the time of his death. His memorial scroll, portrait photo taken in Sheffield, and grave photo have been framed together and hung in the Historic Records office.
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469 Pte Adolphus Glaire, 5th Dragoon Guards

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Arrived overseas: 15 August 1914. Connection: 1914 Star. I was fortunate to be the high bidder on Adolphus Glaire's 1914 Star at auction in January this year. He appears to have gone by the name of 'Dofey' rather than Adolphus, but even so, his name is unique. He was born at Ventnor on the Isle of Wight in 1887, and along with two of his brothers, he was educated at Lowtherville School, Ventnor. He joined the 5th Dragoon Guards in April 1907, arriving overseas with his regiment on the 15th August 1914. Dofey Glaire served throughout the war and in 1919 re-enlisted with the Tank Corps, serving for a further 1 year and 321 days. His original Tank Corps regimental number was 33621 and this was subsequently replaced with the army number 392129. One of Adolphus's brothers, Charles Glaire, was an early casualty of the war, being seriously wounded in September 1914 at the Battle of the Marne, whilst serving with the 1st Hampshire Regiment, and subsequently dying of his wounds ...
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8041 Pte John Finlayson, 1st Cameron Highlanders

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  Arrived overseas: 14 August 1914. Connection: Postcard. John Finlayson stands in the back row, fifth from left. He was born in Broadford, Inverness in 1889 and he enlisted with the Cameron Highlanders at Greenock, Renfrewshire - his place of residence - in 1907. He arrived in France on the 14th August 1914 and died of wounds a little over a month later on the 17th September 1914. He is buried in Villers-en-Prayeres communal cemetery in France.
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41700 Gnr George Thorpe, Royal Field Artillery, 2 Bde

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Arrived overseas: 11 September 1914. Connection: Victory Medal. I paid the grand sum of £20 for George Thorpe's Victory Medal when it came up for sale on eBay in February 2022. George had enlisted with the RFA in February 1906 and although he arrived overseas in France on the 11th September 1914, he was back in England and getting married to Maud Eccersley in Wakefield at the end of the following year. A Wakefield man, George returned to France and was certainly a casualty in 1918. A surviving pension ledger entry gives his year of birth as 1887 and his date of discharge from the army as the 2nd February 1919. Neurasthenia, or 'shell-shock' is listed as the disability which caused his discharge, and he certainly received a pension as a result of this up to 1923. The 1921 census of England and Wales shows George living with Maud at her parents' home at 11 Harvey Street, Belle Vue, Wakefield, with George's occupation recorded as a coal miner at West Sherlaton colliery...
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