Billets at Steenvorde
Training continued on another beautiful day.
Pte. Frank William Rabjohn
(see 1st April) was tried
by Field General Court Martial on a charge of ‘self-wounding’ arising from the
wound he had suffered on 4th October 1916; he was found not guilty.
Pte. Arthur Leeming
(see 30th April) was
admitted to 69th Field Ambulance at Landbouver Farm, north-west of
Reninghest, suffering from myalgia.
Pte. Harold Peel
(see 21st February) was
admitted, via 69th Field Ambulance at Steenvorde, to 50th Casualty
Clearing Station at Hazebrouck, suffering from scabies.
LCpl. Christopher
Longstaff (see 8th March)
was posted back to England in preparation for a course of officer training,
prior to which he would have a period of leave.
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L.Cpl. Christopher Longstaff |
Pte. Richard Marsden
(see 30th April) was
discharged from no.1 Convalescent Depot at Boulogne and posted to no.34
Infantry Base Depot at Etaples en route to re-joining the Battalion.
Following six weeks in hospital being treated for influenza,
Pte. Albert John Start (see 26th March), was
discharged and posted to a Base Details Battalion at Abbeville.
L.Cpl. George Andrew Bridge (see 4th
February), who had been in England since having been wounded in January,
was posted back to France en route to re-join 10DWR. However, on arrival at 34th
Infantry Base Depot at Etaples, he would instead be transferred to 8th
Yorks and Lancs, joining his Battalion on 20th May. In the same
draft as L.Cpl. Bridge was Cpl. Frederick McCall; he had also been an
original member of the Battalion and had at some point (date and details unknown)
been posted back to England. In the absence of a surviving service record I am
unable to make a positive identification of this man. There were 45 other men
in the same draft who were originally posted to 10DWR before being transferred
to 8th Yorks and Lancs; none of them ever actually served with
10DWR. A number had previously served overseas with other Dukes’ Battalions but
the majority were being posted overseas for the first time.
Ptes. Albert Armitage
(see 3rd May) and Tom Darwin (see 19th March), who had been in England since being
wounded on the Somme in July 1916, most recently serving with 83rd
Training Reserve Battalion, were posted back to France en route to re-join
10DWR. However, on arrival at 34th Infantry Base Depot at Etaples,
Armitage would instead be posted to 2DWR.
Ptes. George Barber (see 1st May), who had only two days
previously been transferred to 26th Durham Light Infantry,
was reported as having been ‘absent from fatigues at 2pm’; he would ordered to
be confined to barracks for three days.
Capt. George Reginald Charles Heale MC (see 4th
April) who had joined 2DWR just a month earlier, was reported ‘missing and
wounded’ in action. His Battalion had attacked the Chemical Works near Fampoux
(a task which two Divisions had failed to achieve during the previous three
weeks). They attacked south of the railway with a final objective some two
miles past the buildings. They advanced 2,000 yards in their attack and
captured their second objective, the "Blue Line". However, they were
then swept with machine gun fire and lost all the officers who had survived the
initial rush. The survivors fell back to a position known as the “Black Line”,
some 1,000 yards in front of the trenches they had left that morning.
Casualties were very heavy with one officer and nine OR confirmed killed; nine
officers (including Heale) and 279 OR missing and two officers and 103 OR
wounded. One of the men reported wounded and missing and later regarded as
killed in action was Pte. Fred Crabtree; he was a 22 year-old textile
worker from Little Horton, Bradford and had originally served with 10DWR but
had subsequently (date and details unknown) been transferred to 2DWR. At least six
of the men reported missing were former 10DWR men: Sgt. Brian McAvan MM
(see 29th July 1916) and Ptes. Townend Barrett (see
10th July 1916), James Bradley (18319) (see 22nd
March), Garforth Brooke (see 5th July 1916), Samuel
Butler (see 11th July 1916), Fred Hird (see 16th
January) and Reginald Jerry Northin (see 4th January).
It would subsequently be accepted that Sgt. McAvan and Pte. Butler had been
killed on or around 3rd May; both have no known grave and are
commemorated on the Arras Memorial. It would subsequently be established that
all of the other five had been taken prisoner and would be held at a variety of
prison camps. Pte. Northin had also been wounded, suffering wounds to his
abdomen.
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Capt. George Reginald Charles Heale MC |
Pte. Sydney Whitaker was reported missing in action while
serving with 2nd/5th West Yorks.; he was the younger
brother of of Pte. Edgar Whitaker (see 20th October 1916), who
had been killed at Le Sars in October 1916.
L.Cpl. William Birch Holmes (known as ‘Birch’) (see
8th October 1916), who had been in England since having been
wounded in October 1916, was formally discharged from the Army as no longer
physically fit for service on account of the wounds he had suffered; he would
be awarded the Silver War Badge and an Army pension.
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