gommecourt

From the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website:

Name:LEWES, FREDERICK HENRY MEREDITH
Initials:F H M
Nationality:United Kingdom
Rank:Captain
Regiment/Service:Sherwood Foresters (Notts and Derby Regiment)
Unit Text:Adjt. 5th Bn.
Age:29
Date of Death:01/07/1916
Additional information:Son of Col. H. A. Lewes, and Mrs. L. J. P. Lewes of "Rothsay", Camelsdale, Haslemere, Surrey.
Casualty Type:Commonwealth War Dead
Grave/Memorial Reference:Pier and Face 10 C 10 D and 11 A.
Memorial:THIEPVAL MEMORIAL

5th Battalion Sherwood Foresters were in 139th Brigade, committed to the ill fated 'diversionary attack' at Gommecourt on 1 Jul 1916. The full story of this episode, and its aftermath, is told in "A Lack of Offensive Spirit: The 46th Midland Division at Gommecourt" by Alan MacDonald. This attack was used as a Leadership Study by Majors at the Joint Service Command and Staff College 2007-2010.

“Capt Frederick Henry Meredith Lewes was born on 28th July 1887 and was married to Mrs A Lewes. They lived at 3 Oak Hill Road, Surbiton Hill, Surrey. The son of Col. H. A. Lewes and Lucy Julia Perfect Lewes of Rothsay, Camelsdale, Haslemere, Surrey, he was educated at Haileybury and was a civil engineer. He moved to Derby and worked in the Coaching Section of the Midland Railway. He was commissioned as a 2nd Lt in the Territorial Force on 11th April 1911. He had previously been in the Electrical Engineers, R.E. between 1905 and 1908 and the 4th North Midland Howitzer Brigade from 1908 to 1911. He contracted trench fever in September 1915 and rejoined the battalion on 29th November 1915. He died of wounds on 2nd July 1916. In spite of his body being buried by the Germans it was subsequently lost.”
(p393 A Lack of Offensive Spirit? The 46th (North Midland) Division at Gommecourt By Alan MacDonald)

It appears from posts on the Great War Forum that Capt Lewes, and members of his unit were the only men of their Brigade to reach the German 3rd line, where they were cut off and never seen again. It is likely that they fought in that position until over run, hence the German burial of Lewes's body.

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Probate records states: LIGHT Eric of Redcot Linton-road Hastings died on or since 26 March 1918 in France. Administration Lewes 20 April 1920 to Reginald Hough Light gentleman. Effects £196 17s 8d while the British Commonwealth War Graves Register states: LIGHT, 2nd Lt Eric "B" Coy, 40th Bn. Machine Gun Corps (Inf) 26th March 1918. Age 20. Son Lt Col R H Light (Indian Army, retired) and Mrs R H Light, of Redcot, Linton Road, Hastings

Familysearch has the following: name:Eric Light gender:Male baptism/christening date:04 Jul 1897 baptism/christening place:Bhuj, Bombay, India birth date:03 Jun 1897 birthplace: death date: name note: race: father's name:Reginald Hough Light father's birthplace: father's age: mother's name:Maud Mary mother's birthplace: mother's age: indexing project (batch) number:C99916-5 system origin:India-EASy source film number:523879 reference number:

Again I am grateful to Mr Graham Sacker, custodian of the Machine Gun Corps historical archive who provided the following detail on Eric Light. Monkton Combe School Register (1868-1964): Eric Light b 1897, 1st XI 13-14-15, Hockey XI 13-14, 1st XV 1913, Shooting VIII. Gt War - 2Lt MGC, w.front 1917-18. Kia. Lt Light was educated at Monkton Combe School, near Bath and at Hertford College, Oxford. He enlisted with No 4 Officers Cadet Battalion at Oxford on 11 July 1916 while the Battle of the Somme was in progress on the Western Front. He received his commission and was posted to the Western Front with 188 Company, Machine Gun Corps on 4 July 1917, joining the Company in the field on 21/7/1917. He fought in the Battle of Passchendaele and was wounded on 14 November 1917. On returning to active service, he joined 120 Company, Machine Gun Corps and fought in the action at Bullecourt on 25 February 1918. He was reported missing, aged 20, at Gommecourt during the Allied retreat on the night of 26 March 1918 whilst serving with the 40th Battalion MGC. He is commemorated on the Arras Memorial, Faubourg-d'Amiens Cemetery. Other memorials which bear his name include those at Monkton Combe School near Bath, Alexandra Park at Hastings, Sussex and St Mary-in-the Castle Church also at Hastings. Eric Light was the brother of Hilton Light (Lt.Col. IA).//

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According to the 1901 Census Lt Layard was born in 1897 in Malvern, Worcestershire. He was living at Lorraine Cottage, Great Malvern with his father George S Layard, an author and barrister, his mother Eleanor B, a brother and sister and four servants. According to www.cwgc.org he died on 23 August 1918 and is buried at Douchy-les-Ayette British Cemetery in the Pas de Calais, France

Peter Clement Layard was born on 7 June 1896, the youngest of the 4 children of George Somes Layard and Mary Byng (Gribble). His siblings were George Anthony, b. 1884 (d. 1890); Nancy, b. 1886; and John Willoughby, b. 1891, (a noted anthropologist and psychologist). Extracts of Lieutenant Layard's letters from the Front were posthumously privately published by his father (John Murray, Albemarle St, London 1919). These reveal a remarkable naivete and almost schoolboy attitude towards the war which he nevertheless hated with a passion. In a touching insight to the family grief that his death caused, the book is dedicated to "Peter's Mother for of All People in the World he Loved Her Best". The letters, which include an extensive and insightful character sketch by his father, are available on the internet at: www.archive.org/stream/peterclementlaya00layaiala/petercl... He was certainly asked for as a Trench Mortar officer in May 1916, but it is unclear if he took up the appointment before he was wounded on 19 June 1916. He received a fragmented bullet wound to the head, rendering him semi-conscious, and the tibia of his left arm was severely broken. He reached 14 General Hospital at Wimereux on 20 June 1916 and was soon returned to 'Blighty' to the Northumberland War Hospital near Newcastle upon Tyne (as Wimereux was cleared for the coming Somme offensive). His recovery took some time and he was not passed fit for light duties until September 1917. He returned to his Battalion in France on 24 June 1918, reaching the Front around 1 July 1918 where, now a Temporary Captain, he was soon appointed as a Company Commander. At about this time his Cousin, Captain Julian Royds Gribble serving in the Royal Warwicks, was awarded the VC. (Captain Gribble was posted as Missing - later found to be a PoW, he died of influenza whilst a prisoner). T/Capt Layard was killed in action not at Gommecourt on the Somme, but at Gommiecourt, a village 16 kms S of Arras and 6 kms NW of Bapaume in the Pas-de-Calais Departement. Gommiecourt was captured by 3rd Division on 23rd August 1918 during the final Hundred Days Advance and it would appear that it was in the reorganisation after this attack that T/Capt Layard was reported "shot in the heart by a German sniper". Only Peter Layard and one other officer in his Company had reached the objective, a German strongpoint, unwounded. Whatever the exact nature of his death, having led his Company with considerable bravery, he was almost certainly killed whilst helping a wounded German soldier, having gone back over the route of the Company advance to find more of his men.//

Such a gentle hero.

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