Stockwell War Memorial

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Stockwell War Memorial

Reginald Charles Southon

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R. C. Southon
Service no. 13008
Private, Essex Regiment, 2nd Battalion
Born in Hampstead, enlisted in Westminster, lived in Stockwell
Killed in action on 23 October 1916, aged about 19
Remembered at Thiepval Memorial, France

Information from the 1911 census

In 1911 Reginald Charles Southon, 14, was an errand boy living at 27 Rossiter Road, Balham, where his family shared 5 rooms. He was born in Hampstead, north London. His father, John Charles Southon, 46, was a gas meter maker born in Clerkenwell, married for a year to Reginald’s stepmother, Olivia Estall, 48, from Peterborough. Reginald had a younger brother, Ernest John Southon, 12, born in Clerkenwell. Sarah Combs Tournies, 79, a widow from Lambeth, boarded with the family.

Sydney Herbert John Sore

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S. H. J. Sore
Service no. 614318
Private, London Regiment, 2nd/19th Battalion, formerly 5508, 9th London Regiment
Born in Clapham; enlisted at Oxford Street, London; lived in Clapham
Killed in action on 22 March 1918, aged 22
CWGC: “Only son of Alfred Harry and Mary Emma Sore, of 8 Larkhall Lane, Clapham, London. Served also in France and Salonika.”
Remembered at Jerusalem War Cemetery, Israel

Information from the censuses

Sydney Herbert John Sore, 15, was an architect’s clerk, born in Clapham. His father, Alfred Sore, 48, was a solicitor’s clerk born in South London; his mother, Mary Emma Sore, 40, was from Tuddenham, Suffolk. Kathleen Mary Sore, Sydney’s 7-year-old sister, was born in South Lambeth. The family lived at 8 Larkhall Lane, Stockwell. Ten years previously, they lived next door at 10 Larkhall Lane. They shared their home with Mary’s brother, Ernest Daniel Aldous, 25, a single warehouseman born in Peckham.

William Thomas Snelling

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W.T. Snelling
Service no. R/2283
Able Seaman, Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, Howe Bn. R.N. Div.
Died on 26 October 1917 (missing, assumed killed in action), aged 23
Remembered at Tyne Cot Memorial, Heuvelland, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium

Brother of Frederick William Snelling and cousin of Harold Measday Snelling 

William Thomas Snelling, born in Limehouse, east London on 5 May 1894, the third son of Charles Henry and Emily Jane Snelling, and baptised at St Anne’s, Limehouse on 30 May (see Frederick William Snelling for family details). Formerly of the 2/1st Westmorland and Cumberland Yeomanry, enlisted in the Territorial Force on 30 August 1916, transferring to the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve on 16 June 1917. He joined the British Expeditionary Force on 4 July 1917 and Howe Battalion on 1 September. 

William’s father Charles Henry Snelling of 260 South Lambeth Road, Stockwell, was named as his next of kin. 

Ex-315900 Private 2/1st Westmorland & Cumberland Yeomanry, enlisted Territorial Force 30 August 1916, transferred to RNVR for RND 16 June 1917 ; Draft for BEF 4 July 1917, joined Howe Bn. 1 September 1917 to 26 October 1917 DD (declared dead).
Born 5 May 1894
Next-of-kin: Father, Charles Henry Snelling, 260 South Lambeth Road, Stockwell, London SW9.

Harold Measday Snelling

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H.M. Snelling
Rifleman, London Regiment (Queen Victoria’s Rifles), 1st/9th Bn.
Service no. 4746
Killed in action on 1 July 1916, aged XX
Remembered at Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France, at Sandwich War Memorial and on a now lost wooden war crucifix outside St Anne’s Church, South Lambeth Road

Cousin of Frederick William Snelling and William Thomas Snelling

Chris Burge writes:

Harold Measday Snelling was born in Ramsgate, Kent in 1898, the third child of Frederick and Ellen Sophia (née Rogers) Snelling. In the 1901 census, Frederick worked as a baker and confectioner from premises at 15 King Street in the centre of Ramsgate, two doors from the Prince Albert public house. Ellen’s younger sister Rose Rogers assisted with the business as did a journeyman baker and his sister. 

By 1911 the Snelling family had moved to the more genteel surroundings of the market town of Sandwich, where Frederick ran his bakery from 9 The Cattle Market, in the heart of of the town. Frederick and Ellen were now 43 and had been married 20 years. Frederick listed his three children (one had died) in age order on his 1911 census return: Winifred, 19; Frederick John, 16; Harold, 13. He added Annie Lilian Rogers, his wife’s younger sister, as a visitor. Ellen, Winifred and Frederick John all worked in the business. The family were the sole occupants of the five-room property. 

According to the 1911 census returns, Ellen managed to be in two places at once on census day. She also appeared as a visitor on the return of Frederick’s brother, Charles Henry Snelling, whose family were living at 154 Glengall Road, Peckham. Frederick William and William Thomas were two of Charles Henry Snelling’s six children.

Charles Henry Snelling and family moved to 260 South Lambeth Road around 1914 at which time Harold Snelling seemed to be living with his uncle and working in London. Harold was baptised as an adult at St Anne’s, South Lambeth, on 22 December 1914. His cousin Frederick William Snelling, a civil service clerk, had volunteered at the beginning of the war. Harold volunteered around May 1915 in Central London joining the Queen Victoria’s Rifles. He was drafted to the 1st/9th Battalion in France on 30 March 1916, joining the battalion in a group of 38 men. The QVR were out of the line for most of March, April and until they moved to Hebuterne, south of Gommecourt, at the end of May. They suffered numerous casualties in the front line until the final week of June when the QVR were digging service and assembly trenches in preparation for the beginning of the Somme offensive. On 1 July 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme, the QVR were part of the ill-fated diversionary attack at the northern extreme of the Somme sector at Gommecourt. The battalion suffered horrendous casualties in one day’s fighting. Among the officers six were killed, five were wounded and five missing; in other ranks 51 were killed, 290 wounded and 188 missing; a total of 16 officers and 529 men. Harold Measday Snelling, an acting corporal at the time, was posted missing on this day . 

An article appeared in the Deal, Walmer & Sandwich Mercury on 26 August 1916, entitled, ‘SANDWICH LAD MISSING’: 

‘The following appears in the “St Anne’s (South Lambeth) Parish Magazine’ for August regarding the youngest son of Mr. Frank Snelling, baker, of the Cattle Market, Sandwich, who was recently announced missing:- “News reaches us that Harold Snelling. A member of our choir and A.S.M of our scouts, has been posted missing since July 1. He was in the Queen Victoria Rifles somewhere in France. We fear there is not much hope of his having been saved. It is just possible that he may be a prisoner of war, but confess it is unlikely. We are very sorry, and yet not a little proud. He was one of those people who do not talk a lot, but put a lot of reality into anything they undertake. Not least did Harold count his faith in Jesus Christ, and so we confidently believe he is all right where-ever he is.’

In the course of time, Harold Measday Snelling was officially presumed to have died on, or since, 1 July 1916. His cousin Frederick William Snelling was killed on the Somme on 18 September 1916 and another cousin, William Thomas Snelling, was killed in 1917 during 3rd Ypres.

Frederick William Snelling

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F. W. Snelling
Service no.1676
Lance Corporal, London Regiment (Prince of Wales’ Own Civil Service Rifles), 1st/15th Battalion
Died on 18 September 1916
Remembered at Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France and on the St Michael’s Church War Shrine, Stockwell Park Road

Frederick William Snelling was born on 3 November 1891 in Mile End, east London, the second son of Charles Henry Snelling, a grocer born in Ramsgate, Kent, and Emily Jane Snelling (née Knudson), from Limehouse, east London. He was baptised at St Anne’s, Limehouse on 6 December at which time the family lived at 121 Canal Street.

In 1911 the family were living at 154 Glengall Road in Peckham, southeast London. Nineteen-year-old Frederick worked as a ‘boy clerk’ in the Post Office. There were five other children (one had died as a young child), including William Thomas Snelling, then 16, a junior clerk for a law firm; an older brother, Charles Henry, who was a 21-year-old undergraduate at the University of London; and three sisters, Elsie Emily, 11, Ethel Mary, three, and Ethel May, nine months. Charles Henry Snr was now a timekeeper for a lock and safe company. The Snelling family later moved to 260 South Lambeth Road, Stockwell.

Frederick enlisted at Duke Street in the West End of London served in Europe from 18 March 1915 to the day of his death, 18 September 1916. 

At the time the 1939 Register was conducted, Charles and Emily Snelling were living at 44 Lansdowne Way, Stockwell with their youngest daughter, Emily May (later Bragg). Charles Snelling died in 1941 in Lambeth at the age of 76, and Emily in Folke stone, Kent in 1954, aged 87.

Brother of William Thomas Snelling and cousin of Harold Measday Snelling

William Edward Smith

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W.E. Smith
Rifleman, Rifle Brigade, 12th Bn.
Service no. S/2933
Killed in action on 25 September 1915, aged 18
Remembered at Ploegsteert Memorial, Hainaut, Belgium

Chris Burge writes:

William Edward Smith was born in Lambeth on 18 April 1897 and baptised on 16 May 1897 at St Saviour’s, St George’s Square, Pimlico. He was the first child of William Timothy, from Bethnal Green in east London, and Esther Annie Smith (née Butt) from Pimlico, on the north side of the Thames, who were married at St Mary the Less, Lambeth, in 1895. William Edward was born while his parents were living at 3 Hotspur Street, Kennington and William’s father worked as a ‘carman’. At the time of the 1901 census, the family were living in a five-storey tenement block at 279 Tooley Street, close to Tower Bridge and William’s father was working from home as a self-employed newsagent. 

The 1911 census shows how the family had grown since Edward was born. William Snr was now 38 and Esther, 33. In their 15 years of marriage eight children had been born with five surviving infancy: Edward, 13; Lilly, six; Sidney, three, Frederic, two; and Violet, three months. Esther’s widowed father John Butt was living with them, along with a niece Nellie Tilbrook, who may have been a visitor. William Snr was still working as a self-employed newsagent. Home for the Smith family was now 53 Lambeth Walk where they lived in five rooms as the sole occupants of the property. There were a further three more additions to the family: Ernest, born in 1912, Ivy (1914) and Winifred (1918).

At the outbreak of war William Edward Smith was 17 and the only child in the Smith family likely to play an active part in the conflict. A few damaged pages of his service papers have survived, smudged and barely legible in places but it is clear that he was caught up in the surge of volunteering in late August and early September 1914. He enlisted in London on 9 September, falsely claiming to be 19. At a little over 5ft 10in tall, weighing 8st 12lbs and with a 35in chest, he was not obviously underage. He was recruited to the Rifle Brigade as Rifleman S/2933 Smith, W.E. and initially posted to the newly formed 9th Battalion but was transferred on 1 October to the 12th Rifle Brigade who were at Blackdown near Aldershot, Hampshire. His conduct sheet shows him overstaying a pass at Blackdown and smoking on parade both there and when the battalion had moved to Grayshott by March 1915, and irregular conduct on parade in April at Larkhill. The long months of equipping and training the battalion came to an end when they embarked for France, sailing from Southampton on 21 July 1915 and landing at Le Havre on 22 July 1915. 

The battalion were first in trenches near Fleurbaix in early August and then Fauqissart on the Aubers Ridge. They worked on service and communications trenches in early September before returning to the front line trenches in the same area on 16 September. Orders were received on the 21st for an attack on enemy positions in conjunction with the Meerut Division, to take place on the 25th. The enemy were alerted by the explosion of a mine in their sector and an artillery bombardment. The attack was a costly failure with nearly all the officers either killed or wounded; of the other ranks, 43 were killed, 213 wounded and 76 missing, but believed killed. Rfm S/2933 Smith W.E. was originally listed in the battalion casualty returns as wounded on 25 September. This was revised on 19 November to killed in action on that day.

At the end of the war the Smith family were living at 16 Priory Place and it was William’s father who completed Army Form W5080 in order to receive his son’s medals, plaque and scroll. He listed the entire Smith family on the form, which was witnessed and countersigned at All Saints Church.