12517 Cpl Frederick John Denton MM, 9th Essex Regiment

12517 Corporal Frederick John Denton (pictured, above in October 1916) was a patient at Beechland House from October 1916 until August 1917. His entry in Nurse Oliver’s album reads:

Think kindly of those, that thought so kindly of us in our hour of need.

Wounded at Ovillers La Boiselle in the big Push on the 3rd of July 1916.

12517 Cpl. F.J. Denton
9th Battalion Essex Regt.

Better known as the Hungry Ninth.

1 Somerset Rd Linford
Nr Stanford-Le-Hope. Essex.

Mentioned in Dispatches Sept 1915. Mentioned again June 1916. Awarded the Military Medal
Sept 15th 1916 & presented with the Military Medal by Major General Sir G Kitson KCVO CB CMG on the 25th of November 1916 at the Newick VAD hospital.

There is some confusion about Frederick Denton’s true date of birth. His attestation papers give 20th January 1894 while his daughter gives the same month and day but 1896 as the year. He was probably born on 20th January 1895. The civil registration index of England and Wales 1837-1983 notes that his birth was recorded in the March quarter of 1895 at Orsett, Essex and the 1901 census also notes him as a six year old.

When the census was taken he was living with his family at 17 and 18 Dock Dwellings, Chadwell St Mary, Tilbury. The household comprised: Henry William Denton (head, married, aged 37, a police constable), his wife Amy Louisa E Denton (aged 36) and seven children: Florence Amelia Denton (aged 11), Edward George Denton (aged ten), Henry Arthur Denton (aged eight), Frederick (aged six), Victor Harold Denton (aged three), Walter Cecil Denton (aged two) and Alfred Milner Denton (aged ten months). The children’s father had been born in Tunbridge Wells, Kent; their mother in Islington, London. Florence’s place of birth is noted as Custom House, London but all the other children have “Tilbury” noted against their names.

Alfred Denton died in infancy in 1902 aged two years but three more children were also born after the 1901 census was taken: Amy Winifred Denton in 1901, Margaret Elsie Denton in 1903 (died 1904 aged one year) and Francis William Denton in 1906.

According to his nephew, Frederick’s father, Henry William Denton was born in 1864 and, prior to joining the police force, was an RSM with the Grenadier Guards. He had married Amy Louisa at St George’s Chapel, Windsor in 1886. The civil registration index for England and Wales notes her maiden name as Danton.

The Denton children attended East Tilbury village school and when war was declared all of the brothers (except Francis who was still a schoolboy) volunteered to fight for their King and Country. Florence was married by this stage and running her own household but her younger sister Amy worked as a nurse during the latter stages of the war.

Frederick attested with the Essex Regiment at Grays on 1st September 1914. His age is noted as 20 years and 192 days (although he was probably a year younger than this), his height as five feet, seven inches and his weight as 149 pounds. He had blue eyes and a fair complexion. He gave his occupation as sailmaker for the Orient Steam Navigation Company at Tilbury Docks and his home address as 21 Lower Crescent, Linford, near Stanford-Le-Hope, Essex. He was given the service number 12517.

On the 16th September he was posted to B Company of the 9th Essex Regiment and remained with this battalion in England until 29th May 1915. Posted with him was his seventeen year old brother Victor who had joined up the same day as Frederick and been given a service number just 11 digits apart – 12506. In civilian life he was apprenticed as a painter at the Orient Steam Navigation Company dockyard.

On 11th April that year, no doubt aware that he was going to be posted overseas shortly, Frederick married his sweetheart, Maud Annie Silver at the Parish Church in Mucking, Essex.

He was appointed lance-corporal (unpaid) on 17th May 1915 and less than a fortnight later was in France. He would spend the next thirteen and a half months overseas and during that time would be Mentioned in Despatches twice (in September 1915 and June 1916) and awarded the Military Medal for gallantry in October 1915. In April 1916 he was appointed corporal.

Frederick was wounded at Ovillers La Boiselle on 3rd July 1916 during the opening stages of the Battle of The Somme. The following account is adapted from part 14 of The Hospital Way:

The 9th Essex formed part of the 35th Brigade, 12th Division, its objective the capture of Ovillers. The Division would attack on a two brigade front with the 35th Brigade on the right and the 37th on the left. The 9th Essex would be in support of the attacking battalions of the 5th Royal Berkshire and 7th Suffolk Regiments and all men would take up positions by the 2nd July in readiness for an attack the following day.

At around 3:00 am on Monday July 3rd, the attacking troops of the 12th Division left their trenches and moved under cover of artillery fire to assembly trenches dug in no man’s land. Fifteen minutes later, the barrage ceased and the men rushed the German trenches under cover of a smoke screen to their left. At first, all went well. The 5th Royal Berkshires suffered few casualties whilst crossing and used the cover of a sunken road to lead them straight into Ovillers. The German wire had been virtually obliterated by artillery fire and the men passed with relative ease through the first and second lines until they reached the ruins of houses on the Western edge of Ovillers. Here though, they were engaged in heavy bombing attacks and due to a lack of further supplies of bombs, the leading companies suffered heavy casualties. The 7th Suffolk Regiment’s advance followed a similar pattern. They too passed through the German first line, encountered strong opposition in the second line but pushed forward to the third. This position was strongly held and made even more uncomfortable for the attacking troops by German fire coming in from the left flank.

Fred and Victor Denton and their comrades in the 9th Essex fared even worse. “The march of the Battalion,” wrote one of its soldiers later, “… will forever be remembered by those engaged. Innumerable gun flashes lit the darkness of the night; they seemed endless and as one approached the line, the noise was deafening. After what appeared to be endless marching we reached the trenches in front of Ovillers. They were of hard chalk and with the bad weather not at all easy to negotiate without trench boards. In moving to positions for attack the congestion in the trenches was awful and mortally wounded men could not be moved.” To make matters worse, the German defenders, by now fully awake and repelling the attacking battalions in front of them, were sweeping no man’s land with machine gun fire. Here, states the Divisional History, “considerable casualties were sustained, and the waves of the attack becoming a series of small parties not strong enough to give any material assistance to the forward formations, the 35th Brigade attack broke down and the remnants of the battalions were driven out of the German lines.” C Company, supported by a platoon from B Company managed to reach La Boiselle and capture 200 Germans but it was an isolated success on a morning of strong initial advances, punished by vigorous counter attacks and German machine guns brought up from deep dug-outs which had been unaffected by the intense one hour bombardment which preceded the assault.

By nine o’clock, the Division was reporting that the attack had failed. A combination of flanking machine gun fire, lack of cohesion by troops advancing in the dark and the pock-marked terrain, made impassable in places due to the recent heavy rains, had put paid to the Division’s efforts.

The 6th Royal West Kent Regiment, lost 19 officers and 375 other ranks out of an attacking force of 617. Other battalions suffered similarly. The casualties for the 12th Division’s two attacking brigades amounted to 97 officers and 2277 other ranks and Victor and Fred Denton were numbered amongst them. At around 4am, the 9th Essex attack had come to a standstill and the survivors withdrew to the front line to be relieved by the 7th Norfolks. In little under one hour the battalion had suffered 12 officer and 386 other rank casualties. Corporal Fred Denton had survived the bombardment on the way to the trenches but had taken a bullet in his left forearm which would finish his service as an infantryman. Of Victor however there was no sign and no news and he was posted as missing. Much later, Fred would learn that his brother’s body had been found and laid to rest in France by an old school friend from East Tilbury. Frederick’s nephew records the school friend’s name as “Gorbrer Salmon” and this may be Alfred Salmon (born 1897 in Tilbury). The grave though, would never be found and in time Victor’s name would be added to the memorial to the missing at Thiepval.

Frederick Denton arrived back in England on 8th July and was sent to Beaufort War Hospital in Bristol where he remained until 18th September. He was then posted to the 3rd Essex before being transferred down to the Eastern Command Depot at Shoreham on Sea where he underwent special arm and leg drill. He remained there until 17th October when he was again transferred, this time to The 2nd Eastern General Hospital in Brighton and from there, to Beechland House at Newick.

The presentation of Denton’s Military Medal in November was obviously quite an occasion, not just for the patients at Beechlands but also for the local community as a whole. It was something that the newspapers of the time covered in considerable detail. The Sussex Daily News carried a report on 27th November and this was followed up by two reports published by The Sussex Express and The East Sussex News:

The Sussex Express
December 1st 1916 - Newick
MILITARY MEDAL PRESENTED - At an entertainment given on Saturday evening at the Red Cross Convalescent Home, Beechlands, Corporal F I [sic] Denton of the Essex Regiment was presented with the Military Medal for gallant conduct at the Hohenzollern Redoubt last year. The sergeant of the bombing team was wounded and Denton took charge… Three hearty cheers were given for the recipient, who in a few words of acknowledgement, said the other men present had all done as well as he had, for they had all been out and all had done their bit, (Applause). Subsequently Major-General Kitson said that he had lately been in France (not on active service) and he could tell them from what he saw there was no difference between the old Army and the new. They were all one Army and they were all alike doing their duty. Captain Colesworth [sic] attended the presentation. A very enjoyable entertainment was provided by friends from Brighton, assisted by some of the patients at Beechlands. Corporal Denton, who was accompanied by his wife and child, who are staying in Newick, received many congratulations from those present. He joined the Essex Regiment on 1st September 1914, previous to which he worked as a sailmaker at Tilbury. He went to France in May 1915, gained his distinction in the following Autumn, and in July 1916, was wounded in the left forearm.

East Sussex News
Friday December 1st 1916
NEWICK – PRESENTATION OF MILITARY MEDAL
… the service for which Corporal Denton was given his award had to do with some bombing work last year when his battalion was in an attack against the Hohenzollern Redoubt and subsequently it appears that a sergeant of his platoon was wounded, when he promptly took his place in organizing the bombing teams, carried out their general instructions and he was commended by his officer for his work, in which he ably carried out the duties of a senior NCO. He afterwards received an official card with the following recognition: “Your Commanding Officer and Brigade Commander have informed me that you have distinguished yourself by conduct in the field. I have read their report with much pleasure and have brought it to the notice of the higher authority (signed) S M Scott, Major-General, Commanding 12th Division.”

Frederick remained at Beechlands until 7th August 1917 when he was posted back to the 3rd Essex Regiment. Recovered, but not sufficiently so to warrant further service with an infantry battalion, he was transferred to The Army Service Corps and ended the war as a corporal with C Company of the 1st Heavy Repair Shop. He was given a new number: M/323366.

On 28th April 1919 he was transferred to Class Z, Army Reserve on de-mobilisation. He was awarded a small army pension which recognised his degree of disability as just ten per cent with the likelihood of it being only temporary.

After the war Frederick worked as a training lieutenant aboard the Exmouth training ship at Grays on the River Thames and moved with it to Shotley, Suffolk, when hostilities again broke out in 1939. He died at Chadwell St Mary in 1974 at the age of eighty.

As mentioned previously, all of his brothers also served their King and Country during the First World War. Edward served with the Mercantile Marine. Arthur was a sergeant in the East Surrey Regiment and like Frederick, was also awarded the Military Medal. Walter served with the Norfolk Regiment and was severely wounded at Cambrai in 1917, receiving a full army pension for life. Prior to this he was at sea and was torpedoed aboard the SS Minnewaska off Crete.

43009 Pte Herbert R Barnes, 13th Essex Regt

43009 Private Herbert Richard Barnes was severely wounded in the latter stages of the 1916 Somme battles and left his entry in Nurse Oliver’s album in March 1918. It reads:

43009 Pte H.R. Barnes
13th Essex Regt.

Wounded on the Somme. Nov 13th 1916 & still going strong at Beechlands.

March 18th 1918

Herbert shares this page in the album with 326251 CSM John A C Wilson of the Royal Garrison Artillery, 43262 Private Robert Vinton of the 10th West Yorkshire Regiment and Sergeant J Stewart of the 84th Brigade, Royal Field Artillery.

Herbert was born in Clapton, East London around May 1894, his birth recorded in Hackney district in the September quarter of that year. He appears on the 1901 census living at 68 Goldsmith Road, Leyton with his parents and two sisters. The household comprised: Richard Dean Barnes (head, married, aged 41, running his own French polishing business), his wife Annie P Barnes (aged 38) and their three children: Herbert (aged six), Laura Barnes (aged five) and Florence Barnes (aged three). Richard had been born in Bethnal Green, his wife in Mile End. Herbert and Laura were born in Clapton while Florence was born in Leyton. This suggests the family probably moved from Clapton to Leyton around 1896/1897.

Another household is noted at the same address and presumably the two families lived in a typical Victorian terrace – one family upstairs and the other downstairs. Henry and Lydia Simson are the only members of the other household noted at that address and interestingly Henry’s trade is recorded as a cabinet maker. It seems likely that Henry Simson and Richard Barnes may have also had a business arrangement.

Herbert’s documents survive in a badly burned condition at the National Archives in London (WO 363 series) and from these it is possible to piece together more of his First World War service.

He attested at Lea Lodge, Leyton with the 3/8th (Cyclist) Battalion of the Essex Regiment on 11th August 1915 giving his age as 21 years and three months. He was passed fit and given the regimental number 2207. His enlistment was approved at Colchester three days later and he would remain in England until 30th July 1916.

On 27th April 1916 he was posted, probably to the 1/8th Battalion, and sailed for France on the 31st July 1916. While in France on 1st September 1916 he was transferred, presumably to the 13th Essex Regiment as his album entry (and his medal index card) gives a different number: 43009.

Herbert was wounded in the thigh and right arm on the 13th November 1916 by either shell or gunshot – his surviving records note both at different points – when the 13th Essex launched an attack on a German position known as The Quadrilateral and four lines of trenches south of it. The battalion war diary reports 323 casualties for the 13th November 1916 and in his day-by-day account of action on the Somme in 1916, the author Chris McCarthy has this to say:

“The Division [2nd Division] attacked Redan Ridge with 5 Brigade on the right… On the left, 6 Brigade led with 13th Essex and 2nd South Staffords, with 1st Kings and 17th Middlesex in the rear… The Quadrilateral was the main problem, the wire being mostly intact and because of fog and mud, progress was slow. Some of the Essex and King’s on the right pressed on to the first objective with 5 Brigade. They then formed a block at the junction of Beaumont Trench with Lager Alley… At 7:30am only 5 Brigade was ready to attack their second objective. There were only 120 men from 17th Royal Fusiliers and 2nd Ox and Bucks LI and, on the left, a few Essex and King’s of 6 Brigade. There were not enough to hold any of the footholds but they managed to reach Frankfurt Trench, gradually falling back first to Munich Trench and then Wagon Road and Crater Lane…”

As Herbert himself says, he was a long time in hospital and although his entry is dated 18th March 1918 it would be over a year later (28th March 1919) that his discharge would be approved by the Essex Regiment in Warley, Essex. Even then, right up until the 15th of that month, it appears from what is left of Herbert’s papers that he was still under the care of the Number 2 Eastern General Hospital at Brighton.

Herbert’s discharge papers give his home address as 17 Beaconsfield Road, Leyton, Essex (the same address he had written on his attestation papers nearly four years previously). His next of kin is given as his father – Richard Dean Barnes. Herbert’s character is noted as very good and his length of service in the army is recorded as three years and 230 days.

On 17th April 1919 a Pensions’ Board agreed that Herbert’s degree of disability amounted to 40 per cent, that it was permanent and that it was attributable to war service. The Board members awarded him a pension of 11 shillings per week, effective from 29th March 1919 but to be reviewed in 26 weeks. Herbert’s papers do not give details of subsequent Board meetings but the likelihood is that his award was probably scaled down over the coming years.

Albert Leggett

Albert Leggett's service record survives as a burnt document in the WO 363 series at the National Archives. Ancestry has just made service records I-N available on-line and so, twenty odd years after I first transcribed Albert's entry in Nurse Oliver's album, I have been able to find out more about him. I've now written up my notes and updated Albert's page on the website.

Albert was not a resident of Chailey but a wound on a battlefield in France would ensure that he would soon be acquainted with the parish. He enlisted with the Northamptonshire Regiment at Norwich in April 1915. By the end of July that year he was in France and, posted to the regular 1st Battalion, would fight through Loos and the Battle of the Somme until severely wounded at Pozieres in August 1916. He was in hospital in France for just under a month and then, returning to England in September 1916, would spend at least another ten weeks in hospitals in England; first to the 2nd Eastern General Hospital at Brighton and then to Beechlands (or Beechland House) in Newick. Later transferred to the 2/5th Scottish Rifles and then the RAMC, Albert would spend the rest of the war in England. The leave that he was granted from hospital in December 1916 was beneficial to Albert and his wife. In September 1917 their second child was born.

Albert was discharged from the army in March 1919 and two months later, a grateful country, acknowledging that his wound amounted to a 20 per cent degree of disablement, awarded him a weekly pension of five shillings and sixpence, to be reviewed twelve months later. Subsequent Board papers do not survive but it seems likely, given the many other soldiers' papers I have seen, that his award was reduced.

Ninety two years on

Horace Ham was in the line opposite Hawthorn Redoubt when it was blown up at 7.20am on 1st July 1916. He wasn't a Chailey man but he was there on the Somme on the day that the British Army suffered its heaviest casualties in a single day. Today, it's headline news when a soldier is killed in Afghanistan. On 1st July 1916, the British Army sustained nearly 60,000 casualties, almost a third of these killed and most of those killed in the first hour of the British attack. The failure of that attack and the reasons behind it have been written about ever since. But today, 92 years on, I'll leave the talking to Horace Ham.

Horace was 93 years old when I interviewed him at The Royal Star and Garter home in Richmond-upon-Thames in 1988. Before the war he was a footman, but on July 1st 1916 he was a private soldier, one of Kitchener's men waiting in a trench, ready to go over the top with the 16th (Public Schools) Battalion of the Middlesex Regiment.

"The 1st July 1916 was a proper mess up. You see we were told that all the barbed wire would be cut and all the Germans would be dead, all that sort of thing. Instead of that, the Germans were very clever. They'd built marvellous dug-outs which they built properly. They were like houses underground, beds and everything in there. The Germans said they were going to stay put and when our people started shelling, they went down their dug-outs. As soon as they stopped and we advanced, they came up, put their machine guns up and mowed our fellas down like ninepins.

"I was lucky mind. I saw Hawthorn Ridge go up and I got hit in the hip with a bit of shrapnel just as we started. I didn't actually get over the trench, I was lucky. All my pals got killed or wounded, gone. There was five of us sort of joined up together. There was myself, a fella named Walker, a fella named Richardson and two brothers named Mellish - they came from Wembley. We sort of palled up and all went around together in the army. Well on the 1st July, I got wounded, Richardson got wounded, young Mellish got through it and Jerry Walker and the eldest Mellish we never heard of, they got killed.

"I should have been in the first wave but I was lucky, I tell you. I was really lucky and I've had my fingers crossed ever since then. I wasn't the only one. Bags of them got wounded just as it started. I saw some of the fellas that came back when we were being seen to and you've never seen such wounds in your life. I've seen some terrible sights but who hasn't in war?"

PS/1491 Private Alfred George Mellish is buried in Hawthorn Ridge Cemetery Number 1 at Auchonvillers. Jerry Walker must be PS/1609 Private Alfred Walker who was killed on this date (the only Walker killed whilst serving with the 16th Middlesex) and who is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial. The 16th Middlesex lost seven officers and 155 men killed on 1st July, others would die of their wounds over the days that followed.

At the going down of the sun, and in the morning, WE WILL REMEMBER THEM.

Richard William Gibson

I've updated the page for Richard Gibson and added him as another Great War fatality. Chailey Parish Magazine doesn't have an awful lot to say about him. He's mentioned as serving his King and Country in 1914 but by December 1916 he disappears altogether.

Whilst I can't be sure, I feel fairly confident that this man is the same Richard William Gibson who lost his life in September 1916 whilst serving with the 2nd Royal Sussex Regiment. He was a regular soldier (enlisting circa 1904) and an Old Contemptible, having arrived in France at the end of August 1914.

Richard has no known grave and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial on the Somme. His name does not appear on the Chailey War Memorial or on the memorial at Hailsham where he was born.

A heavy sacrifice

On 23rd April 1918, Alexander Plummer, serving with the 19th Battalion of the Durham Light Infantry, was killed in action. He was the youngest of six boys and one of three brothers to be killed during the First World War. His brother Albert Plummer had been killed in action on 2nd July 1916 whilst a third brother, Owen Plummer, had been killed on 5th April the previous year. Alexander has no known grave and is commemorated on the Pozieres memorial. All three brothers are also commemorated on the Chailey war memorial.

Also mourning two sons in April, were James and Margaret Smith of Yew Tree Cottage, Cornwell's Bank, Newick. Their son Frederick James Smith had been killed on 17th April 1917 at Arras and now, on 26th April 1918, another son, George Spencer Smith, was killed in Belgium whilst serving with the 13th Royal Sussex Regiment. He is commemorated on the Tyne Cot Memorial. Tragically, James and Margaret also lost two other sons to the Great War: Septimus Sydney Smith at Gallipoli on 19th August 1915 and Edward George Smith on the Somme on 26th July 1916. All four brothers are remembered on the war memorial at Newick.

Thus between them, the Plummer family of Chailey and the Smith family of Newick lost seven sons, holding the unenviable distinction of being the two families from those two villages who made the greatest sacrifices.