1st Battalion, Grenadier Guards
Alfred Dyde was born in 1893 at in Kineton, Gloucestershire, one of five sons born to Charles William and Emily Dyde. Charles was a carter.
According to his Medal Index Card he landed in France on 6 October 1914. The 1st Grenadier Guards would have been involved in several actions during BEF’s retreat from Mons, in the early months of the War. He was named in the 25 January 1915 edition of the Cheltenham Chronicle and Gloucestershire Graphic as having been made a prisoner of war: he was said to have been captured on 27 October 1914, when the battalion was located in the Kruisecke area of Ypres. International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) records appear to indicate he was an inmate of Wahn-Schiessplatz PoW Camp (near Cologne).
The newspaper published a photo and quoted from correspondence received home: Just a card hoping it will find you all well at home. I have had several parcels from Winchcombe lately. Please thank Mrs Bird, Mrs Halliwell and Mrs Stott of Stanton. I am unable to write to them myself, so will you please thank them for me. Don’t forget. I shall be glad when this is all over then I can come home and see you. Now cheer up and let me have a letter as often as you can. Am in the best of health at present. Let me know how Allan and the boys are.
Alfred had barely returned home after four years of captivity when he died on 28 December 1918. He was remembered by a local resident as ‘a nice young man, whose death so soon after his return after four years as a prisoner, was seen as a tragedy in the town.’
A recently released Pension Record Card states that Alfred’s next of kin was his father, who lived at Gretton Road, Winchcombe and that he may have been re-patriated on 11 April 1918 and the cause of death was pneumonia.
It appears that his brothers Allan and Horace were also early recruits to the Army.
Researched by Graham Adams 23 October 2019 (revised)