Category Archives: Royal Berkshire Regiment

Douglas Walter Baker

Alfred Sutton School War Memorial, Army, Commemorated name/s, RFC / RAF, Royal Berkshire Regiment, Somme, Y.M.C.A.

Douglas Walter Baker
Flight Cadet 

Division 7

BAKER DW CEM  CIMG2084

Douglas Walter Baker was accidentally killed whilst flying at RFC/RAF  Beaulieu, (a flying training school) in Hampshire on 26th October 1918.  His parents, Mr and Mrs Henry Baker, lived at 196, Kings Road, Reading.  Douglas was their youngest son.  Douglas is commemorated on the  family grave Number 12830, Berkshire Family History Society classification 7G20.   However, his registered war grave is in St. Paul churchyard, East Boldre.  Beaulieu flying school was based at East Boldre between November 1915 and 1919.

Details of his career  appeared in the Standard 9th November 1918.  Douglas joined up in September 1914 and after 5 months training went to France with the 1st/4th Royal Berkshire  (Territorial) Regiment in February 1915.  After eleven months on active service he was selected because of his previous mechanical training, along with a number of others, to return home and go into the workshops at Farnborough as a 2nd Air Mechanic.  He was very quickly promoted to 1st Mechanic.  In 1916 he was ill for four months with rheumatic fever.  Six months before the end of the war he volunteered for service as an officer in the RAF.  Having passed the Central Air Board in London he went for training as a pilot at Hastings, Bristol and Uxbridge.  Within three months he was sent to Beaulieu to qualify for his ‘Wings’.  On qualifying he would have gained an automatic commission.  Tragically it was on eve of finishing his instruction when the accident happened; he had been allocated his service machine .

Douglas Baker was spoken of very highly by his officers and tutors.  He was considered to have great promise as a pilot.   Douglas was very popular and had many friends.  Douglas lost his life so near to the end of the war, however, his parents may have been comforted by the words that concluded the article.  “It seems very hard to have one dear to us killed in England, but we must realise that the fact that he was doing his duty to his home and country just as much as the most renowned airman in France”.

 

William Annetts

Army, Registered War Grave, Royal Berkshire Regiment

William Annetts
Private 3229
2nd/ 4th Batt. Royal Berkshire Regt.

 Division 9

ANNETTS WTE

William Annetts was the  son of William Annetts, of 11, Amity Street,  Reading.  He died on 16th February 1916,  aged 20.  William is buried in a registered war grave number 10512 and this is marked with a CWGC war pattern  headstone.   

February 19th 1916 Standard 1916  William Annetts died in training at Newcastle on Tyne aged 20 he had been in the Army 18 months first at Chelmsford and the Burnham-on-Crouch before going to Newcastle.

 Further information, source not recorded, stated that Willam Annetts had gone to France to prepare for the Big Push, i.e. The Somme Battles.

Details of his war service still have to be obtained

Albert Gilbert Allen

Alfred Sutton School War Memorial, Army, Cambrai, Commemorated name/s, Royal Berkshire Regiment

Albert Gilbert Allen
Private 45498
8th Battalion Royal Berkshire Regiment

 

 Allen AG photo  Allen AG Rcem com

Albert Allen was aged 18 years when he was killed in action on 23rd October 1918.  He was the youngest  of seven brothers serving “Their King and Country”.  The notice of his death appeared in the Chronicle on 6th December 1918.  His parents lived at 56, Filey Road.  Albert’s name is commemorated on the Vis-en-Artois memorial panel 7.  The memorial was erected to the memory of those who fell in the advance from 8th August 1918 to the Armistice 11th November 1918.

 On the 22nd October 1918 the 8th Battalion moved to Le Cateau, as part of the 18th Division which was due to attack the following day.  We are told in “Their Duty Done” Colin Fox et al that “by late evening the men were in their assembly positions east of the village facing L’‹vÃque Wood.  The ground over which the attack was to be made was rough grassland with no connected trench systems but with strong German defensive positions organised in depth around machine gun posts……………..Zero hour was 1.20am on 23rd October.  The Royal Berkshires’ assembly point was a deep railway cutting east of Le Cateau from where they would advance onto the second objective.  Enemy shelling here caused 15 casualties…..a temporary dressing station was blown in by a gas shell…….At 1.15am the companies moved out of the cutting…..A creeping barrage moving forward at the rate of 25 yards a minute supported the attack……..At day break the enemy began to retire and Captain M Wykes took the leading companies of the two battalions and rushed the road, capturing over 30 light and heavy machine guns.  The advance continued and the second objective, a line some 1,500 yards beyond the first…..was taken by 8.30am and held throughout the day”.  The total advance for the day was some 8,000 yards.  Casualties for the day were reported as one officer killed, two officers wounded, other ranks – 19 killed, 1 died of wounds, 67 wounded and 3 missing.  Albert Allen was one of those killed in action.