19th Battalion, The King’s (Liverpool Regiment)
Edgar Hargreaves was born in Burnley, Lancashire in late 1881 but some sources say 1880. There is a something of a mystery regarding his parentage. The CWGC Register states that he was the son of Benjamin and Mary Hargreaves.
However, a Public Member Tree on Ancestry lists his parents as Benjamin (1841-1919) and Elizabeth (née Lowcock: born 1841), who were married in 1864. The couple are shown as having nine children, these shown as step-children to Edgar and his brother Harold (born 1883), who are shown as additional children with an unknown father. So his mother’s name may be recorded incorrectly in the CWGC website and Benjamin is not his father!
As can be seen below, Benjamin and Elizabeth do not feature as a couple in the two censuses held prior to the Great War. It is believed that Elizabeth died in 1929. Edgar’s parentage and early life is open to further investigation.
It has not been possible to find any entry for Edgar Hargreaves in the 1891 Census, however, in that of 1901 he was shown as living with his mother (named as Elizabeth) in Burnley: his occupation is a ‘bookkeeper’s assistant’. By the time of the 1911 Census he had moved from Burnley to Liverpool and was living, as a boarder, at 100 Cambridge Road, Seaforth, Liverpool (West Derby Registration District) and had become a traveller in wholesale stationery.
On 17 September 1914 he married Eleanor Reeves at the Church of St Thomas, Wavertree, Liverpool. She was eleven years younger than Edgar, having been born in 1892. They made their home at 77 Moss Grove, Sefton Park, Liverpool.
Six days prior to this event, on 11 September 1914, Edgar had attested for military service. He signed on as a ‘Special Reservist’ which meant that he would undertake a period of training before being transferred to a one of the front line battalions as and when required. At that time he was aged 32 years and seven months and his stated occupation was a ‘weighting inspector’ with the Dock Board.
Very unusually, Edgar Hargreaves’ Army Service Record appears to have survived intact. This shows he was posted to the 19th (Service) Battalion (3rd City) of the King’s (Liverpool Regiment), one of several ‘Pals’ battalions raised in Liverpool by Lord Derby.
Much of the following year was spent in training, at Belton Park, Grantham from 30 April 1915 and at Larkhill, on Salisbury Plain in September 1915. There were a couple of disciplinary incidents, both relating to being absent without leave. That in December 1914 resulted in being confined to barracks for three days and the October 1915 absence lead to the loss of three days’ pay and eight days confinement.
The battalion arrived in France to join the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) on 7 November 1915, as part of 89 Brigade, 30th Division.
Their first major action was on 1 July 1916, the fateful opening day of the Battle of the Somme.
The 19th King’s Liverpool acted as brigade carriers that day, moving supplies up to support 30 Division’s attack on the village of Montauban, on the extreme of the British advance. Whilst taking part he was wounded, sustaining a two inch long wound to his left wrist caused by a piece of shrapnel. He was taken, via a Casualty Clearing Station, to a Base Hospital at Rouen where the shrapnel was removed and he was sent back to England on 10 July on board the Hospital Ship St George.
The wound must have been more serious than it sounds, as he was sent to a military hospital in York, where he stayed until 25 October 1916. Following his discharge from hospital he remained in the UK until 15 January 1917, when he returned to France. Initially he was posted to 24 Infantry Base Depot (IBD) at Etaples, the vast BEF training complex on the coast, south of Boulogne. Here he awaited deployment back to the front line. This occurred on 6 February 1917. His posting was not back to the 19th Battalion of the King’s Liverpool but to the 1/9th Battalion, a Territorial Force unit, part of 165 Brigade, 55 Division.
On 20 September 1917 the battalion was located in the Ypres Salient, on ground south east of St Julien and north west of Zonnebeke. It was to take part in the Battle of the Menin Road (20-25 September), one of the very many actions which made up the Battles of Third Ypres (31 July – 10 November 1917), sometimes known as ‘The Battle of Passchendaele’.
At 4.45am the King’s Liverpool men had moved into shell holes forward of the British front line, which they would use as the jumping off point of their advance behind a creeping artillery barrage. As they waited for zero hour at 5.40am they came under heavy German artillery fire and once the advance commenced the leading companies suffered greatly as a result of a hail of machine gun and rifle fire.
Ultimately the attack was successful and the Germans were driven out of their positions, sometimes by use of the bayonet. The battalion suffered 265 casualties amongst other ranks in the attack, of which 190 were wounded: Private Edgar Hargreaves was one of their number.
He sustained a gun shot wound to his pelvic bone on the left side and also to his left arm.
After initial treatment at No 12 Casualty Clearing Station he was transferred as a stretcher case to the No 5 General Hospital at Rouen and thence to England on 25 September. Upon arrival his was despatched to Naunton Park Red Cross Hospital, Cheltenham, where he was to stay from 27 September 1917 until 26 May 1918 (242 days).
Information on his final days are contained in a Medical Officer’s report from the hospital and also a report of his death in the Gloucestershire Echo of 27 May 1918. Having arrived at the hospital Edgar was making a satisfactory recovery from his wounds up to 22 April. On that day he underwent a small operation to remove a small piece of diseased bone.
Post operation he contracted a pneumococci infection affecting his lungs and brain and this was linked to an outbreak of a similar infection amongst Australian soldiers at this and other hospitals. It was probably the ‘Spanish influenza’ prevalent at the time. He died at 6.15pm on 26 May 1918, aged 36.
Private Edgar Hargreaves was buried in Cheltenham Cemetery, where a standard Commonwealth War Graves Commission headstone now marks his grave. His widow, aged only 26 when he died, re-married in April 1920, becoming Mrs Hiatt.
Researched by Graham Adams 1 June 2020