Thomas Cyril Church

Army, Huntley & Palmers, Other Regiments, Registered War Grave

Thomas Cyril Church
Private TR8/30487.
51st Battalion, Hampshire Regiment

Division 76
Extension

 Thomas Cyril Church was the youngest son of  Henry William and Fanny Church, of 56 Orts Road, Reading.  Tom Church was 18 years old when he died of pneumonia on 17th November 1918.   His is a registered War Grave with a family memorial headstone and also a war pattern headstone because the original inscription is now unclear.  Grave number 16535. 

  The announcement in the Standard of 23rd November 1918, states that he died at Colchester Military Hospital, after great suffering patiently borne.   His war service details have not be found.

Tom Church is buried near to his brother in law Victor Houghton Wicks who died in 1921 in the R38 Airship disaster.

Tom Church is commemorated on the Huntley and Palmers War Memorial.

Martin Henry Child

Registered War Grave, RFC / RAF

Martin Henry Child
2nd Lieutenant Armament School (Uxbridge)
Royal Air Force

 Division 78
Extension

 MHChild gravve

Martin Henry Child was the eldest son of Thomas Henry and Nancy Child of Connaught Rise. Reading.  His is a registered war grave with an impressive private memorial. His parents and sister are buried with him.  Grave number 16530. 

 Martin Child’s death on the 13th November 1918, aged 21, must have been all the more tragic given the declaration of the Armistice only days before. 

 An account of his death and war service was published in the Reading Standard on 30th November 1918.

“Death of Second Lieut. M.H.Child – who passed away on Nov. 13th at the Cottage Hospital, Uxbridge, from pneumonia, at the early age of 21.

Educated at Christ’s Hospital Horsham, later became a member of staff at Sir Samuel Scott and Co.’s branch of Parr’s Bank. 

At the age of 18 he joined the Royal Naval Air Service as an aerial gunner, and on April 2nd 1917 proceeded to Italy, was stationed at Tatanto, where he fell victim to malaria fever.  After being in hospital in Rome for several weeks, he was invalided to England, and arrived home in January 1918. The Medical board deemed him permanently unfit for further flying.  Stationed at Warash, he was promoted to the rank of sergeant and shortly after commissioned as an armament officer.

His commanding officer wrote well of him.  The funeral from the Wesleyan Church Oxford Rd and interment in Reading cemetery”.

 

Alfred John Chapman

Army, Royal Berkshire Regiment

Alfred John Chapman
Private 7091
3rd Battalion /   later 1st Battalion
Royal Berkshire Regiment.

 Grave Location – Tilehurst St. Georges Church burial ground.

Chapman A J

Private Alfred John Chapman, was born in Streatley and enlisted at Churn.  He lived at 44, Coley Terrace, Reading.

The Reading Chronicle Jan 15 1915  (pg. 5 col. 5) published an account of his  military funeral.  Private Chapman had several years service in the militia being called up as a Reservist at the outbreak of war.  He received a shrapnel wound in November 1914,  whilst at the front and was for a time at the Cambridge hospital.  On returning home his health gradually gave way and he died on 5th January 1915.  Several members of Private Chapman’s regiment attended the funeral and the coffin was borne by 6 comrades, a firing party was in attendance..

A report in the Reading Standard Jan 16th 1915 stated that the funeral took place in the Reading cemetery.   However, the grave number was unknown and several searches of the burial records later revealed that he was not in fact buried in the Old Reading Cemetery but in Tilehurst.

The 3rd Battalion Royal Berkshire Regiment

 At the outbreak of war in August 1914 the Depot of the Royal Berkshire Regiment and the HQ of the 3rd Battalion (Special Reservists) was at the Barracks, on the Oxford Road in Reading.

The duties of the Depot and the 3rd Battalion staff centred around the call up and the provision of clothing and equipment for all the Army Reservists  of the Regiment.  In total about 1,800 were called up and 540 despatched to the 1st Battalion.  Alfred John Chapman was almost certainly one of these men.

The remaining 1260 men went to Cosham, then Fort Purbrook, later they were based at the Victoria Barrack, Portsmouth and in November 1917 the Battalion was sent to Portobello Barracks, Dublin.  During the war Petre tells us that the 21,605 officers and men passed through the 3rd battalion.  15,533 were sent to the BEF.  The remaining 7,000is accounted for by transfers, discharges, deaths, desertions and demobilisation.

After the war men from all battalions of the Regiment were sent to the 3rd Battalion for demobilisation.  This included returned prisoners of war.  Demobilisation was a complicated affair and there were many grievances.  “Pivotal men” i.e. those called up late in the war, largely employers, were let out first so that other men could have jobs to go to.  However, the fighting men thought that they were being let out under false pretences.   However, in Dublin, there was reportedly an excellent mess and occupations like football, cross country running, boxing, ceremonial parades and picnics in Phoenix Park kept the men busy.  A added occupation involved the rounding up members of Sinn Fein.  The 3rd Battalion was “disembodied” on 5th September 1919.