Giles Daunt. Photo by kind permission of Will Daunt
G. V. Daunt
Second Lieutenant, South Lancashire Regiment, 10th Battalion, attd. 6th Battalion
Killed in action in Mesopotamia on 9 April 1916, aged 19
Brother of Conrad O’Neill Daunt
Remembered at Basra Cemetery, Iraq
Awarded the Victory, British and Star medals
On 20 August 1914 Giles Vellacott Daunt, aged 18 and working as a clerk, joined the Royal Fusiliers as a Signaller. He was almost immediately offered a commission in the South Lancashires (with whom his brother Conrad also served). Quite apart from his middle-class background – he was a son of the physician and surgeon Francis Eldon Horsford Daunt – he must have looked the part. Six feet tall, over 11 stone and with a 41-inch chest, blue eyes and fair hair.
In February 1916 Daunt embarked on the H.M.S. Ionic, headed for Port Said, Egypt and then Basra, Iraq. He was reported missing in action on 9 April 1916. His death was later confirmed. A memorandum of 6 August states that his body was buried at Sanniyat.
