Thursday 13th January 1916

Front line trenches north of Rue du Bois.

At 12.30 am a patrol from ‘B’ Company went out into No Man’s Land, comprising of 2Lt. Samuel Lawrence Glover (see 27^th August 1915), along with Cpl. Herbert Waddington (see 7^th April 1915) and Ptes. Albert Edward Lawton (see below) and Frank Peel (see below). The patrol got over to the German barbed wire without seeing anything. Once arrived there 2Lt. Glover and Cpl. Waddington, leaving Ptes. Lawton and Peel behind, had started to crawl under the German wire to see how strongly their trenches were held. Half way through, however, the Germans had sent up a flare, and had fired heavily on the two who were fully visible. Cpl. Waddington had been heard to call out, "I am done for," but 2Lt. Glover had never moved, having apparently been killed at once. Of the other two members of the patrol, Pte. Lawton was hit, and sent Pte. Peel back for help; he, however, had lost his way and wandered all night before returning to the British lines at 9 a.m. Despite being referred to as having returned “in a very exhausted state” and being “off his head for two days” Peel was able to confirm that both Glover and Waddington had been killed and that Lawton had been close by at the time but he could not be sure what had happened to him. 

Concern about the patrol had been raised when they had not returned, and at 3 a.m. Capt. Herbert  Montagu Soames Carpenter (see 5^th September 1915), commanding ‘B’ Company, had sent out a party to search for the missing men, but they had found no sign of them. However, later in the day another patrol, led by Lt. Harold Lockhart Waite (see 27^th August 1915), was sent out to look for Glover and the others. They reported that they had seen Glover’s body on the German wire but had been unable to recover it.

Samuel Lawrence Glover was born in St Helens on 1^st June 1895, the first child of Thomas and Ada Glover; Thomas worked as a gasworks manager. The family subsequently moved, first to West Bromwich and then to Norwich, where they were living, at Cliff House, St Leonard’s Road, on the outbreak of war. By then there were two younger children, Christine and Thomas Bernard. Samuel Glover had been educated at Mill Hill School, London between 1910 and 1913 and had then worked as a ‘pupil’ at the gasworks managed by his father. On 7^th September 1914 Samuel had enlisted in London with the Public Schools Battalion, Middlesex Regiment, with whom he remained until being commissioned on 3^rd January 1915. He had then been posted to 10DWR and arrived with the Battalion in France in August 1915.

Albert Edward Lawton was a 21 year-old dyers’ labourer (working for Messrs. Holden and Burnley) from Girlington,Bradford; he was married with one daughter. Frank Peel was a 27 year-old miner from Bradford.

Lt. Samuel Lawrence Glover

The remainder of the day, with some light rain falling, passed off fairly quietly.


The fate of Lt. Glover’s patrol was referred to by Pte. William Knox (see 8^th January), as he once again wrote to his wife, Ethel (I am most grateful to Rachael Broadhead and family for allowing me access to William’s letters).

“I now sit down and write you a few lines hoping they will find you quite well as I am very pleased to say that it leaves me very well just at present. We are in a very dangerous place just at present. It is an old farm building where we are billeted just behind the firing line and I can tell you we have to be very careful how we go about as bullets are flying all about us. You ought to see the old ruins. It is heart-rending to see it.

I received a parcel from home for my birthday. It contained a plum pudding, a cake, mince pies and about a dozen apples. It came in very handy. I boiled my pudding in my canteen and it was extra but I was not able to make any sauce as we were in the trenches.

The first from Lord Derby’s Scheme will soon be in training now and I’ll bet they have a hard time of it too. The Boshes have just started sending a few shells again. It was a grand sight to see our guns letting go on Tuesday night about twelve o’clock. It was pitch dark but when they started it was lit up all over for miles about us and the Boshes sending us some over as well and sending red flares up. It was a real fifth of November do but it was on a different mission. I have just received a parcel from Dolly. It is an iced cake for my birthday. It is rather late, but better late than never.

Our Battalion had a bit of bad luck last night. We sent a patrol of men out and by all accounts they must have come across a German patrol larger than themselves as only two of them has returned up to eleven o’clock this morning so the other four will be either killed or taken prisoners.

The Boshes would not half have a tale to tell in Berlin as they brought one of our aeroplanes down yesterday but we got one of theirs down on Sunday afternoon so it was only tit for tat as they say. When you send another parcel will you send me a lead pencil as it is a job to get one here. I think we go back for our Divisional rest on Saturday but will let you know next time I write”.

Pte. George Wallace Fricker (see 12th October 1915) was posted back to England; the reason for his departure is unclear and it has not been established whether he was wounded, ill or simply posted back for alternative duties.

Pte. Thomas Riding (see 21^st October 1915) went home to England on one weeks’ leave; this would allow him to see his first child, Thomas, who had been born in October.