Category Archives: Services

Edwin James Prior

Alfred Sutton School War Memorial, Army, Other Regiments, Passchendaele

Edwin James Prior
Private 41177
9th Battalion Norfolk Regiment

Prior EJE photo

Edwin James Prior died 15th April 1918 aged 19 years.  He has no known grave and his name is commemorated on the Tyne Cot Memorial to the Missing panels 34 to 35 and 162A.

Edwin Prior was the brother of Arthur James Prior of 65, Foxhill Road, Reading.  Information on the caption of a photograph printed in Berkshire and the War, gives details of him belonging to the South Staffordshire Regiment and attached to the Lincoln Regiment.  An address of 10, High Street, Belston, Staffordshire is given.  The caption goes  on to state that he was twice wounded and was late of Caversham.

More details about the German Spring Offensive around Ypres have been given in the biography of Reginald Newport.   Edwin Prior, although in a different regiment would have experienced similar difficulties.  By 11th April Armentieres had been evacuated by the British and Haig issued this famous speech to his men “…..Every position must be held to the last man: there must be no retirement.  With our backs to the wall….each one of us must fight to the end.”

On the 15th April, the day that Edwin Prior died, the bloodily won ridge of Passchendaele was evacuated and the British divisions withdrew to a line around Ypres which approximated to that of 1915.  The British were below full complement and the new men, replacing those lost in Third Ypres, were young and incompletely trained, although they fought bravely. (Martin Matrix Evans – Passchendaele)  The different details about regimental information for Edwin Prior may be due to the fact that he was taken into different units to make up the numbers at various times.

Thomas Porter

Army, Commemorated name/s, Other Regiments

Thomas Porter
Sergeant  M2/046569
15th Div. Train, Army Service Corps

 Division 7

Porter T photo

Sergeant Thomas Porter is remembered on the grave of his parents Henry and Rosanna Porter who died in 1922 and 1948 respectively.  The commemoration states ‘Died of Wounds in France’.  The Berkshire Family History Society classification number is 7A15.  There are no family details in the CWGC information.  A picture from Berkshire and the War gives the home address as 36 Sherman Road, Reading.

The 1911 census indicates that Thomas and his wife Blanche and son Denis then aged 1 year were living with his parents at 4 Sherman Road.  Thomas was a furniture porter his father worked at the biscuit factory.

 Thomas Porter died of wounds on 18th July 1917, aged 26.  He is buried in Boulogne Eastern Cemetery, Pas de Calais.  Grave reference IV.A.35.

Boulogne was one of the three Base ports most used by the British Armies during the war.  Boulogne and Wimereux formed one of the chief hospital areas.  Thomas Porter was probably wounded some distance away from Boulogne. 

J W Porter

Army, Arras, Commemorated name/s, Other Regiments

J W Porter
Bugler 9137
“G” Company 2nd Battalion
Oxford & Buckinghamshire Light Infantry.

Division 69
Extension

Porter W photo

J W Porter was the son of  Mr and Mrs F. Porter of Reading and the husband of Emily Walker (nee Porter) of 449, Brooklyn Street, St. James’, Winnipeg, Canada.  He died of wounds on 14th September 1915.  He is commemorated on his parents grave, number 18168. 

Bugler Porter is buried in Chocques Military Cemetery, Pas de Calais, France.  Location Plot I. D. 99.

 Chocques  lies north west of Bethune near Gonnheim.  From late autumn 1914 to the end of the war Chocques was occupied by the British.  The graves in Plot I were on men who died of wounds in No. 1 Casualty Clearing Station which was posted in the village.  The officers were buried in Plot V.  The casualties would have been fighting on the Bethune front.