Author name: Adrian Smith

27th Battalion (Manitoba), Canadian Infantry Ernest Frederick Ledbetter was born at Blockley on 26 October 1887. On 30 April 1908, at the age o f 20, he emigrated to Canada, eventually ending up in Birtle, Manitoba, where he found work as an agricultural labourer. He enlisted into the Canadian Army at Birtle on 1 April […]

Royal Flying Corps The 1901 Census has a man of this name down as being born at Gosport, Hampshire in 1889 and at the time of the census he was a scholar at Christ’s Hospital School, Newgate, London. It cannot be certain that this is the same man. His name does not appear to be

Machine Gun Corps (Tanks) Ernest John Buffin was born at Fairplay Cottages, Plump Hill, Mitcheldean in 1896, the son of Henry and Elizabeth Buffin. He started his working life as a hod boy in a local colliery (hod boys were employed to drag wooden boxes on skids loaded with coal from the coalface, a menial

17th Battalion, Lancashire Fusiliers John Emerton Sanders was the elder son of Richard and Charlotte Hay Sanders of Homestead, Old Bath Road, Cheltenham. He was educated at Wycliffe College, Stonehouse between 1909 and 1914 and on the outbreak of war applied for a commission in the Army. Impatient at the seeming delay, he enlisted as

8th Battalion, The Black Watch James Rutherford was born in 1891 and was an offce worker in Edinburgh when the war broke out. He was one of the first 100,000 to volunteer, an honoured status within Kitchener’s Army, when he joined the 8th Battalion The Black Watch in September 1914. The battalion crossed to France

HMS Torrent – Royal Navy John Creed Rudge was born on 3 August 1895 at Wotton-under-Edge, where he also went to school. He was one of seven children. As a young man he worked as telegraph messenger in Wotton’s Post Office and was a member of the local Baptist Church. In 1910, aged 15, John

2nd/4th Battalion Gloucestershire Regiment Frederick William Richings was born in 1877 to Roseanna and Alfred Richings of Cirencester. He served 24 years with the Gloucestershire Regiment. He was with 1st Battalion during the Boer War and endured the Siege of Ladysmith. At the outbreak of the Great War he was posted to Bristol to train

9th (Queen’s Royal) Lancers Albert (Bert) James Richards was the son of the Charfield Parish Council Chairman who was also the village postmaster. A former Dursley Territorial, he joined the 9th Lancers, who landed in France on 15 August 1914. At the end of October 1914 the 9th Lancers were located in trenches in the

Household Battalion Cecil Hugh Pope was born on 30 November 1895 in Elkstone. In 1911 he was living with his parents, James Pearce (Auctioneer, Valuer and Farmer) and Clara, his two sisters, Hannah Sophia and Clara May, and his two brothers, Jack and Critch, at Coombend, Elkstone. He attended Cirencester Grammar School for six years.

1st / 12th Battalion London Regiment (The Rangers) Raymond Pockett was born in Cheltenham in 1897, the son of John Daniel and Annie Maria Pockett of 45 Burton Street. Before the war he worked as an ironmonger in Cheltenham High Street. In June 1915 he enlisted with the Gloucestershire Regiment as Private 23351 in the

Royal Engineers Sidney Pitman was born in the small village of Gotherington, just outside Bishop’s Cleeve. He enlisted in the Royal Engineers on 9 September 1915 and for a period he served with D Company,Training Depot, Royal Engineers before being sent overseas. After 12 months’ service, Sidney was invalided back to ‘Blighty’ where he was