Category Archives: Other Regiments

Brian Harold Frearson

Army, Other Regiments, Registered War Grave

Brian Harold Frearson
Pioneer 237853
‘A’ Signal Depot Bedford
Royal Engineers

War Plot
Division 71 &72

The information for Brian Harold Frearson was supplied by John Frearson.

Brian Harold Frearson 1 Brian Harold Frearson 2

Brian Harold Frearson was born on 1st June 1898. 

 His family had always been farmers, and can be traced back to Derbyshire in the 1600s.  The family moved to Lincolnshire in the early 1800s. Brian’s father, Henry John FREARSON was born on a farm in West Barkwith, Lincolnshire in 1853, but because of difficulties finding farms, he moved to Hampshire with two of his brothers sometime between 1871 and 1875, and farmed in Barton Stacey.  Henry married Annie Mary SYMMONDS in June 1880.  She had been born in Appleford in Berkshire in 1858, but her family moved to Hampshire when her father become the tenant of a neighbouring farm.  Henry John was a successful [and prize-winning] sheep farmer. Brian was the youngest of eleven children born to Henry and Annie between 1881 and 1896.  All but one survived into adulthood, so Brian had five brothers and four sisters. By the time of Brian’s birth, the family had moved to Odstone Farm, at Odstone Tything, in Ashbury, a village between Faringdon and Swindon.

 Little is known of Brian’s early years; he probably had a governess at the farm.  By the age of 12 or 13, Brian was attending Swindon College being in “Year 1911”.  The College was originally set up in 1843 by the Great Western Railway Company to provide educational classes for its employees. There is also a stained glass memorial window to him, and the other “old boys” and former college staff at Swindon College who lost their lives in the Great War. This is located in the original building of Swindon College.  

 

Brian Harold Frearson 6 Brian Harold Frearson 5

 

Brian joined up, it appears, at the age of 17 or 18 [the dating of a photograph of him in uniform as 1914 is likely to be an error].  He served from about 1916 – 1918 as a Pioneer in the “A” Signal Depot Bedford, Royal Engineers [Regimental No. 237853] during the First War.   This suggests that he was first sent for recruit training to the Royal Engineers Signal Service Depot at Bedford.  A note in the Swindonian [the Swindon College magazine] in autumn 1916 reads:  

 

“BH Frearson (1911) has been employed as a wireless operator on a transport to India”.

 

 It seems that he was later posted to France or Belgium.  He suffered in a gas attack, and was repatriated to England and sent to the Redlands Hospital in Reading.  He died as a result of the gas on 4 February 1918.  He is buried in Reading Cemetery in “Plot 72”, which is a separate area surrounded by hedges.  There are no longer any marked graves, although photograph taken at the time of the burial shows a separate grave.  The screen-wall memorial now commemorates those buried there.  His inscription reads: –

 

 “237853.  Pioneer B. H. Frearson.  Royal Engineers.  4.2.18    38”. It is assumed “38” was the grave number. 

Brian Harold Frearson 4 Brian Harold Frearson 3

I am greatful to John Frearson for the information he has supplied about his relative and especially for the photographs of the graves in the War Plot. As John says the War Plot is laid to lawn. The photographs of the individual graves and their markers are very interesting. Some of the original markers were moved to the outside of the plot behind the hedge others have disappeared.

 

 

Walter Pearce, Ernest Albert Pearce and Charles Edward Pearce

Army, Commemorated name/s, Other Regiments, Royal Berkshire Regiment, Ypres

Walter Frank Pearce
Private 19987
8th Battalion Royal Berkshire Regiment

 Division 64
Extension

Pearce WF photo Pearce bros Rcem commemorat Pearce EA photo

Walter Frank Pearce and Ernest Albert Pearce are commemorated on a large family headstone.  Their parents were the late William Edward and Phoebe Pearce of 22, Chesterman Street,  Reading.  The 1911 census indicates that Wlater, then 17, was working as a confectionary apprentice. Ernest was a grocers assistant. Other family members included William 29 and Charles 19 who were drapery porters; sisters Hilda 22 and Florence 14 no occupation is given for either sister.

Walter died of wounds at Cambrai as a prisoner of war on 21st September 1916, aged 22.  He is buried at Porte de Paris Cemetery, Cambrai.  Location I.B.7.

 Ernest Albert Pearce
Private Royal Berkshire Regiment

 Ernest was killed in action at St. Julien on August 16th 1917 aged 27.  He was part of a Trench Mortar Battery.  The allied forces had on that day attacked along a nine mile front north of the Ypres – Menin Road crossing the Steenbeek River.  The ground was torn by the barrage and the low water  table made No-Mans Land a morass.   All the objectives were captured and the British reached Langemarck and half a mile beyond however,  the  Germans pressed the British back from the high ground won earlier in the day.

Charles Edward Pearce was also injured in the war.
Private 43978
7th Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment

Charles service record indicates that he enlisted in February 1916 and was posted to the Royal Berkshire Regiment. However he was serving with the 7th Warwickshires when he wasinjured. He suffered from trench feet in the winter of 1916 and received gun shot wounds to his neck and chest on 5 December 1917. It is believed that he recoved from these injuries and was able to walk again. He signed his own medal receipt and it is believed that he survived the war.

 

Thomas Henry Palmer

Army, Commemorated name/s, Other Regiments, Royal Berkshire Regiment, Ypres

Thomas Henry Palmer
Private 9829
1st Battalion Dorsetshire Regiment

 Division 12

Palmer TH photo

Thomas Henry Palmer’s home address was 98, Pitcroft Avenue, Reading.  He is commemorated on a his family’s grave. His father was James Palmer, a railway clerk and his mother Rosalind Palmer. The 1911 census indicates that Rosalind had borne nine children although only four servived. A daughter Rosalind May Keys, her husband Herbert and son Charles were living with the Palmer family. Thomas’s two sisters Alice and Bessie were also living in the family home.  Thomas enlisted on 27July 1914, some days before the official declaration of war. Perhaphs with the intention of making acareer change. He was almost 24 years old. He  joined the Dorset Regiment on 7 August and he was posted on active service  overseas in October 1914.  His service record on Ancestry UK indicates that his occupation was that of a fitter and turner.  Thomas had served in the 1st/4th Royal Berkshire Regiment  (Territorial Force) before the enlisting in the Dorset Regiment. His mother Rosilind is given as his nextof kin in the service record and it was she who received his medals and personal effects upon his death. Thomas Palmer was killed in action on the 26th April 1915.  He  is buried at White House Cemetery, St. Jean-les-Ypres, location IV. A.42. 

Although the commemoration on the kerbs states killed in action in France, Thomas is actually buried in Belgium.  The “White House” was on the Ypres road, between St. Jean and the bridge over the Bellewaardbeek.  The cemetery was begun in March, 1915, and used until April, 1918, by units holding this part of the line.  Originally it contained Plots I and II; but after the Armistice these Plots were completed, and III and IV added, by the concentration of graves from the battlefields round Ypres and from smaller burial grounds.   Thomas Palmer’s service record states that he died from the effects of a gunshot wound. It is probable that his body was brought to  the White House Cemetery from a smaller burial ground belonging to a casualty clearing station after the Armistice .

 The Second Battle of Ypres had begun on 22nd April 1915.  The Germans used poison gas for the first time during the next week.  On 26th April the British launched counter attacks against the Germans south-east of Pilckem and towards St. Julien.  The efforts came to naught with the British incurring 4,000 casualties during the day as they faced the superior German machine guns and artillery.  Thomas Palmer is believed to have been a casualty of the fighting which took place in the area.