Stockwell War Memorial

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B names

Percy Bigg

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P. Bigg
Service no. CH/17624
Private, Royal Marine Light Infantry, H.M.S. “Formidable”
Died age 19 on 1 January 1915
Son of Alfred Bigg, of 12, Thorparch Road, Wandsworth. Born at Lambeth.
Remembered at Chatham Naval Memorial and at Stockwell War Memorial, London SW9

Private Bigg died after H. M. S. “Formidable” was torpedoed by a German sub and sank off Portland Bill. 547 crew (35 officers and 512 men) out of total of 782 died, including the captain (Captain Loxley). The wreck site is protected under the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986.
MaritimeQuest has a list of all lost on the Formidable.

Information from the 1911 census

In 1911 the Bigg family lived in 6 rooms at 4 Victoria Place, Priory Grove. Alfred Bigg, 44, was a carman for a laundry. He was born in Hertfordshire. Ellen Bigg, 44, was born in Fontmell Magna, Dorset. There were 7 surviving children (of 11):
George Alfred Bigg, 22, a carman, born in Kennington
Rose Bigg, 20, a shell box maker, born in Kennington
Bertram James Bigg, 19, a painter, born in Kennington
Percy Bigg, 15, a porter, born in Battersea
Sidney Bigg, 9, born in Battersea
Arthur Bigg, 8, born in Lambeth
Albert Thomas Bigg, 3, born in Lambeth

William Spencer Benson

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W. S. Benson
Service no. 35733
Private, Royal Army Medical Corps, 17th Field Ambulance
Died of wounds 23 April 1917, aged 20
Born in Brixton, enlisted in Holborn
Remembered at Bethune Town Cemetery, Pas de Calais, France, and on the war shrine at St Michael’s Church, Stockwell Park Road, London SW9 0DA.

Information from the 1911 census

William Spencer Benson, 14, was the eldest child of William Spencer Benson, 43, and Jessie Elizabeth Benson, 35. William the elder was a general labourer, while William the younger was a paper boy. The other children were
Jessie Elizabeth Benson, 12
Henry James Benson, 9
Rose Esther Benson, 4
Edith Phyllis Benson, 7 months
Henry James Benson, 33, brother to William, and Richard Smith, 28, both single and both working as labourers boarded with the family. All in the household, at 62 Ingleton Street, were born in Brixton.

William Albert George Benson

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W. A. G. Benson
Service no. 634829
Private, London Regiment, “A” Coy. 20th Battalion; formerly TR?10/108398, 23rd T.R. Battalion
Killed in action on 1 September 1918, aged 19
Son of William Albert and Rose Louisa Benson, of 34 Willington Road, Stockwell
Remembered at Sailly-Saillisel British Cemetery, Somme, France

Information from the 1911 census

William Albert George Benson, who was 11 in 1911, lived with his family in 5 rooms at 4 Tandridge Place, Stockwell, SW9 (Tandridge Place has now disappeared – I think it was in the area of Clapham North tube). William’s father, William Albert Benson, 36, was a carman (transporting grain and manure), born in Bermondsey. His mother, Rose Louisa Benson, 38, was from Sydenham. The children on the census were
Eleanor E. A. Benson, 14, born in Bermondsey
William A. G. Benson, 11
Frederick C. E. Benson, 9, born in Bermondsey
Rose L. Benson, 4, born in Clapham
Jessie V. Benson, 2, born in Clapham

William Elias Beney

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W. E. Beney
Service no. 20342
Private, Machine Gun Corps (Infantry), 36th Coy.
Died on 30 November 1917 aged 25
Husband of Mahala Beney, of 120 Cowick Road, Upper Tooting, London.
Remembered at Cambrai Memorial, Louveral, Nord, France

William Elias Beney, the son of William Beney, a coal porter living in 1911 at 1 Belinda Road, Loughborough Junction near Brixton, enlisted in Lambeth, in 1914 or 1915. His mother Mary Ann nee Nichols died a year after his birth in 1892. William Snr remarried and had seven further children. William Jnr is not found on the 1911 census.

The Service Medal and Award Roll states that William Elias Beney’s death was accepted on 11 November 1917, suggesting that he was one of the Missing. He left a widow, Mahala (nee Williams), and a son, Frederick, born in 1914.

John Edward Bean

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J. E. Bean
Service no. 50155
Corporal, Royal Field Artillery, “C” Bty. 49th Bde.
Died of wounds on 22 August 1916, aged about 44
Remembered at Heilly Station Cemetery, Mericourt-l’Abbe, Somme, France

The 1911 census return completed by 43-year-old ‘Edward John Bean’, a dustman born in Brixton living in three rooms at 5 Carfax Square (now replaced by local authority housing), Clapham with his wife Ada, their son Edward, four, and Ada’s three children from a previous marriage. Edward and widow Ada Gilbert (née Purkiss) had married five years previously at St Paul’s, Clapham. 

In January 1906 Edward, then working as a coachman, and Ada had their son Edward baptised at Holy Trinity, Clapham, along with two of Ada’s children from her mariage to George Gilbert. They lived at 2 St Alphonsus Road, Clapham.

Edward attested in Camberwell, southeast London in 1914 or 1915. The Army records consistently show him as John Edward.