This article is based on research I carried out for a private client in 2020. It concerned the life and death of Arthur William Greenway.
Enlistment and training
On 22 June 1916 Arthur was deemed to have enlisted into the army under the terms of the 1916 Military Service Act. He was technically placed into Section B Army Reserve but at this stage continued with his civilian life.
On 25 September 1916 he was called to attend a medical examination held at the Recruitment Office at 6 Hartfield Road in Wimbledon. It was recorded that he was aged 34 years and 5 months, lived at 11 William Road in Wimbledon, had the occupation of labourer and was married. The examination revealed Arthur to be the average 5 feet 5 inches in height. Flat feet and that he had a hernia that needed to be held by a truss led to him being placed into medical classification Ci: this was considered to be fit only for light duties within Great Britain.
Arthur was mobilised on 25 October 1916 and found he had had been allocated to the Suffolk Regiment and specifically to its 4th Battalion. He was ordered to report to the battalion’s depot at Ipswich and was confirmed as Private 6434.
With his “home service only” medical classification, Arthur was then posted to join the 64th Provisional Battalion. This was a unit of the Territorial Force that was for “home service only” trops and used for coastal defence. It was located at Salthouse in Norfolk.
On 1 January 1917 64th Provisional Battalion was transferred to the Suffolk Regiment and renamed as its 14th Battalion. During March 1917 the men who were serving with the battalion were renumbered: Arthur became Private 290812. It is clear that at some point he was re-rated as fit to serve overseas.
France and Flanders
On 14 June 1917 Arthur went overseas as part of a reinforcement draft that sailed from Folkestone to Boulogne. The draft proceeded at first to number 15 Infantry Base Depot, a camp at Etaples.
On 5 July 1917 Arthur was transferred to the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, posted to join its 1/8th Battalion and renumbered as its Private 325034. His new battalion’s war diary mentions the arrival of a draft of 180 men on 7 July 1917. On arrival he was allocated to the battalion’s A” Company.
Killed in action
The various documentary records agree that it was on 27 August 1917 that Arthur lost his life, but it is an assumed date. It was that on which he was missing in action. The battalion took part in an offensive operation in the vicinity of Saint-Julien during the Third Battle of Ypres. When the battalion was withdrawn from action and roll call taken, it was discovered that the losses had been 35 killed, 83 wounded and 54 men were missing. Records of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission name 66 men of the battalion with the date of death of 27 August 1917.
Commemoration
Arthur is commemorated at the vast memorial at Tyne Cot, which implies that he has no known grave. It is possible that no burial ever took place in the circumstances of the battle; alternatively he may have been given some form of burial on the battlefield and the grave destroyed by shellfire that continued to fall on the Poelcapelle area. It is however not impossible that he lies in a military cemetery, but unidentified. If so his grave will be marked as “A British soldier – known unto God”. I provided my client with an analysis of where the men of the battalion whose deaths are considered to have been on 27 August 1917 are buried.
Of the 66 dead, 46 are commemorated at Tyne Cot and just 20 have a known, named grave. Every one of the 20 is shown by CWGC records to have been located during battlefield clearance in 1919. They were taken to four different cemeteries. At all of these locations are many men who could not be identified, including some known to have been with the Royal Warwickshire Regiment. It must be considered possible that Arthur is amongst them and therefore lies at either Bedford House Cemetery, New Irish Farm Cemetery, Poelcapelle British Cemetery or Tyne Cot Cemetery, the latter co-located with the memorial.
The 1/8th Battalion of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment (Territorial Force)
This battalion was established as part of the new Territorial Force in 1908. It was headquartered at Aston in Birmingham, a district in which a memorial to the battalion stands today, not far from the Villa Park football ground.
It came under command of the Warwickshire Infantry Brigade of the South Midland Division, along with the regiment’s 5th, 6th and 7th Battalions. Only the 7th was not a Birmingham unit: it was based in Coventry and Leamington Spa. In 1915 the formation names would be modified to the 143rd (Warwickshire) Brigade and the 48th (South Midland) Division.
The division landed in France in March 1915 and by the time that Arthur joined it as part of a reinforcement draft it had become an experienced, battle-hardened unit. In particular, it had fought during the Battle of the Somme in the summer of 1916 and in the pursuit of the German strategic withdrawal from the Somme to the “Hindenburg Line” in the spring of 1917.
Arthur with the battalion and the circumstances of his death
When Arthur arrived, the division was in reserve, with the battalion being located at Berles-au-Bois, a village south west of Arras and several miles behind the front line of the time. It was carrying out training, resting and reorganising.
To the north, in Flanders, the British were preparing to conduct a major offensive. It became known as the Third Battle of Ypres and began on 31 July. The battle would develop into one of the largest, longest and most costly actions of the Great War, adding to the terrible, notorious reputation that the Ypres sector had already acquired. The 48th (South Midland) Division received orders to move to Flanders: the battalion moved by train on 22 July, arriving at St. Jans-ter-Biezen, a village in the rear where it would continue training until called upon. On 30 July, the battalion moved forward to Border Camp but at this stage remained in reserve.
The initial British attack proceeded well, although at a heavy cost in casualties. It penetrated the first German defensive system and began to advance but was soon brought to a standstill by unusually heavy and sustained rainfall. The ground soon became quagmire which rendered further operations difficult.
On 7 August, a small number of the battalion’s officers and NCos went into the battle area to make a reconnaissance, for the division had received orders to relieve one of the divisions which had made the initial attack. Next day, officers went forward again but could not reach the allotted area due to heavy enemy shelfire: it was an ominous beginning. The battalion remained in the rear and continued to train.
On 12 August a number of NCOs again went forward and the battalion also provided a working party: shellfire caused casualties to both. On 15 August the battalion relocated to Dambre Camp, taking over tents and bivouacs from another battalion of the division.
Finally, on 16 August the whole battalion moved forward into the battle area: it was Arthur’s first time in the front line. The position was on the eastern bank of the Steenbeek, normally a fairly small stream but now swollen by the recent rains into a wide morass which had proved to be a difficult military obstacle. Over the next days, the battalion came under heavy shellfire while it attempted to improve its position and in places pushed about 100 yards further from the mud of the Steenbeek. On 18 August, it was relieved and moved back to a camp near Reigersburg chateau on the west side of Ypres. It had sustained 94 casualties in killed and wounded without carrying out any operation other than holding its ground.
With the weather now improving (although it would soon rain again), plans were made for a renewal of the offensive. On 22 August the battalion moved forward to the Ypres-Yser Canal north of the ruined city of Ypres, coming under a bombardment of poison gas shells as it did so but suffering no casualties.
During the evening of 26 August, “A”, “C” and “D” Companies moved forward to take up a position for attack. In terrible weather, they arrived at their allotted place and dug in. As morning dawned, the weather gave promise of a finer day, according to the war diary. The attack, described well in the war diaries and illustrated by maps, below, began at 1.55pm under an intense British artillery barrage.
Links
I used the Linesman softrware from Great War Digital to produce the maps