Saturday 24th July 1915

L. Cpl. Fred Swale (see 7^th April) was confirmed in his post and began to be paid in accordance with his new rank, whereas his post had been previously unpaid. 

Pte. Thomas Butler (see 22^nd July) was reported by CQMS Thomas Doyne (see 6^th February) as having been, “not shaved when parading for picquet”; on the orders of Lt. Stephen Moss Mather (see below) he would be confined to barracks for three days.

Lt. Stephen Moss Mather was 24 years old (born 6^th March 1893). He had enlisted in the Notts and Derbys Regiment in October 1914 at which point he had been working as a shop assistant in Nottingham, though he was originally from Manchester. On 27^th November 1914 he had been commissioned Second Lieutenant and posted to 10DWR.

At home in Bradford, Amy Turner, wife of Pte. William Turner (see 2^nd June), gave birth to the couple’s first child; the baby girl would be named Amy.

The Burnley News carried a report about a fund-raising effort directed at equipping the former home of the Tunstill family for use as a war hospital. In 1903, Harry Tunstill, father of Gilbert, had moved from Montford Hall to his father’s even grander home at Reedyford House on the outskirts of Nelson where William had maintained a staff of ten domestic servants. However, in 1909 Harry began the construction, in the hamlet of Thornton Rust, near Aysgarth, of a new country house which he called Thornton Lodge and which would eventually become the family’s main residence. The exact point at which the Tunstills had left Reedyford has not been established, but it is clear from the newspaper report that the house was now in the hands of the local Corporation.

A PATRIOTIC EFFORT

A house-to-house collection is being made in Nelson today (Saturday) in aid of the equipment as an auxiliary military hospital of Reedyford House, formerly the residence of the Tunstill family and now the property of the Corporation. The local Co-Operative Society set a good example to the inhabitants on Thursday by their decision to present six fully-equipped beds to the hospital. Three of these are the gift of the general committee, the other three being presented by the education department, Women’s Guild, and the employees of the Society.