This blog has always been about promoting our hobby, or at least, my own very small part in it. This post is a little different and I hope that you will find it of interest.
On November 16, 1916, during the closing phase of the Battle of the Somme, my maternal grandmother's brother Joseph Scarr, was killed in action defending the small village of Hebuterne, near Arras, some 50 miles south of Calais. He was barely 18 years of age. From the battalion history it seems that although there was little direct offensive action going on at that time, they were under extremely heavy shellfire and although I can't be sure, I think that was probably what killed him. Two of his comrades from the same battalion are buried on either side of him, the four of them also having been killed in the few days that they were in the line.
When I was young, my grandmother would occasionally talk of her brother, although it was clear that even 60 years later, it was still a painful memory. He volunteered for the 11th (Bantam) battalion of his local regiment - the Royal Lancasters, when he was only 17. Like many in the Lancashire mill towns of the time, he was below the regulation 5 feet 3 inches required to be accepted into the army, hence his enlistment in the regiment's "Bantam" battalion, composed of men over 5 feet but under 5 feet 3 inches. After training the battalion was sent to France, as part of 40th Infantry Division, a formation that was, I believe, composed almost entirely of Bantam formations.
Hebuterne cemetery itself has a slightly chaotic layout, where each of the sections that make it up contain casualties from a different phase of the war. The first seems to hold those from the fighting in 1915, another from the Somme battles and another from the 1917 operations. The village was fought over again in 1918, this time 53 of the casualties coming from the New Zealand division, including at least one Maori. In addition there are a number a gravestones around the edge of the boundary wall with the names of men who are "known" or "believed" to be buried there. There are also at least four Germans interred amongst their former enemies.
It was a very sobering experience to read the gravestones; no less than 10 of the soldiers were only 17 years of age and most of the rest, as one might expect, were in their early to mid twenties.
I was nice to be the first member of our family to visit his grave - as far as I know, my grandmother, her sister and parents never knew where he was buried or even if he had a known grave.
The only known surviving photo of Joe taken shortly before leaving for France.
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission does a fantastic job in looking after these places.
As we were leaving, we came across this plaque at the village church in memory of the Bradford Pals who fought and died there. As you can see someone had left a poppy wreath. In the cemetery's visitors book there were several entries for 2024, showing that some of those buried there are still remembered, which was nice to see.
