2/4th Battalion, Norfolk Regiment
Leonard Thomas Campin (his headstone indicates he was probably known as Willie) was born in 1884 in Stow-on-the-Wold. He was the son of John Edward and his wife Margaret Ellen (née Luker), who lived at Sheep Street, Stow-on-the-Wold. John Edward was a house painter. The 1901 Census indicates that the couple had two sons, the elder (age 19), Walter Edward, was a painter’s apprentice, whilst Leonard Thomas (age 16) was a grocer’s apprentice.
The 1911 Census records that Leonard was boarding in School Road, Evesham, with Eliza Roberts, a 59 year old widow and was employed as a grocer’s assistant.
Leonard’s Army Service Record has not survived and there are only bare details of his service that can be gleaned from other sources.
The Cheltenham Chronicle of 30 December 1916 reported that he died at Wheatley Hall Hospital, Doncaster, of pneumonia, six weeks after enlisting. As he died on 17 December (age 32), he must have joined the 2/4th Battalion, Norfolk Regiment in or around October 1916 – almost certainly as a conscripted man. This unit was a Territorial Force battalion, who had been based in Doncaster from October 1916.
He was brought back to Stow-on-the-Wold for burial on 21 December 1916 and a large white stone cross was erected over his grave.
Leonard’s brother, Walter Edward, saw service on the Western Front. He served as a Private (number G/249510) in the 7th Battalion, Queen’s Own (Royal West Kent) Regiment, who were part of 53 Brigade, 18 Division, when deployed in the ‘Forward Zone’ of the British defences at Moy, south east of St Quentin, when the Germans mounted their massive Spring Offensive on 21 March 1918. On that day the 7th Royal West Kents were virtually wiped out, losing 20 Officers and 577 Other Ranks, killed, missing or wounded. Walter Campin was almost certainly amongst those killed in action. The CWGC records him as having died on 28 March but the battalion war diary gives no details of casualties on that day and it was probably the day on which Walter was presumed having died in the onslaught. Private Campin’s body was never found and he is named on the Pozieres Memorial to the Missing of 1918.
John and Margaret Campin had lost both their sons in the Great War and they died in 1929 and 1933 respectively.
Researched by Graham Adams 24 March 2017