Stockwell War Memorial

Friends of Stockwell War Memorial & Gardens

age 21

Henry James Robert Woodcock

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H. J. R. Woodcock
Service no. 6951
Private, London Regiment (London Scottish), 1st/14th Battalion
Killed in action on 9 September 1916, aged 21
CWGC: “Son of Mrs Eliza Woodcock, of 15 Meadow Place, South Lambeth Road, London.”
Remembered at Serre Road Cemetery No 2, France

British Army WWI Service Records 1914-1920

The Service history file for Henry James Robert Woodcock contains few details. Woodcock enlisted in the Territorial Force on 28 February 1916 and was posted on the same day.

1911 Census

Henry James Robert Woodcock, 16 in 1911, was one of eight children of Henry Woodcock, 44, from Gorleston, Norfolk, and Eliza Woodcock, 41, from Donhead St. Mary, Wiltshire. He lived with his family at 125 Lavender Hill, Battersea, and worked as a book assistant. Six of Henry’s siblings are on the census return: Gertrude Marion Woodcock, 18, a scullery maid; Godfrey Randall Woodcock, 13; Gordon Harold Woodcock, 10; Gwendoline Woodcock, 8, Walter Herbert Woodcock, 5; Marjorie Woodcock, 1. All but Gertrude, who was born in South Lambeth, were born in Battersea. Blanche Woodcock, 17, was a domestic servant in Mayfair. In 1901 the family lived at 26 Grayshott Road, Battersea.

Alfred Willis

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A. Willis
Lance Corporal, Royal Engineers, 39th Coy. AA Section.
Service no. 563845
Died on 7 March 1919, aged 21.
Remembered at Cologne Southern Cemetery, Germany

Chris Burge writes:

Alfred Willis was born in Clapham in 1897 to Arthur and Ellen Mary Willis who had married in 1894. Both of Alfred parents were from Kent. Arthur was listed on the 1897 Electoral Roll at 4 Larkhall Lane, Stockwell. In the 1901 census, the family of three were living a 2 Larkhall Lane and Arthur was working as a hay and straw salesman. Alfred’s younger sister Marion Edith Willis was born in 1902.

By the time of the 1911 census the Willis household had moved to 267 South Lambeth Road, situated just beyond the Stockwell Terrace, and consisted of Arthur, 43; Ellen Mary, 42; Alfred, 13; Marion Edith, nine; and Ellen Laura Dowell, 37, Arthur’s cousin by marriage. One of Arthur and Ellen’s babies had died in infancy. Arthur still made his income as a salesman of hay and straw. The family lived in some comfort in a two-storey house with seven rooms and a basement.  

Alfred Willis was conscripted around May 1916, a date estimated from the war gratuity paid to his father in 1919. Alfred joined a Territorial Force unit of the Royal Engineers as denoted by his original army service number T/2833. His service papers have not survived but the papers of Sapper 563844 (T/2384) V.H. Prodham provide a guide. Prodham, a clerk from Ealing, worked for the Gas, Light & Coke Company in Horseferry Road, Westminster and was conscripted into the ‘London Electrical Engineers’, his service reckoned from 8 May 1915. At the outbreak of the war the London Electrical Engineers, who specialised on searchlights, were based at 46 Regency Street, Westminster, on the north side of the Vauxhall Bridge. London experienced its first Zeppelin raids on 31 May/1 June 1915 and a double ring of searchlights and anti-aircraft guns was established around London in 1916. Zeppelin raids continued into 1916 with bombs dropping on Brixton and elsewhere in South London. Gotha bombers began raids in May 1917. Between June 1917 and May 1918 they made about 17 attacks on London. 

There is some ambiguity in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission records as to which AA company Alfred served in and whether Alfred was deployed in England or France before the 1918 Armistice. Both the 39th Coy. AA Sect. and 3/Coy AA Sect. are mentioned in CWGC documents; they had both operated in France from 1916. There was also a no.39 AA Company based at Bower’s Gifford on the Isle of Sheppey operating six three-inch 20-hundredweight guns plus eight searchlights, as part of the Thames and Medway AA Defence Command. Commonwealth forces entered Cologne on 6 December 1918, less than a month after the Armistice, and the city was occupied under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles until January 1926. Alfred’s death was not combat-related and he may have passed away during the third wave of influenza pandemic in 1919 while serving in the army of occupation.

Alfred’s parents remained at 267 South Lambeth Road with Ellen Laura Powell until about 1930.

Stanley Herbert Williamson

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S. H. Williamson
Service no. TF/265478
Private, Royal Sussex Regiment, 2nd/6th battalion
Died 29 August 1917, aged 21
Remembered at Rawalpindi War Cemetery, Pakistan

This identification was made by Chris Burge, who writes:

Stanley Herbert Williamson was born on 5 January 1896, the sixth child of George and Matilda Williamson. Stanley was baptised at St.Gabriels, Pimlico, on 4 March 1896 when the family lived at 7 Clarendon Street and Stanley’s father worked as a dairyman. By 1901, the Williamsons had moved nearer to Westminster and the family had grown by one.

In the 1911 census the family had moved south of the river, living at 105 Kennington Road, Southwark. Stanley and five of his siblings lived with their parents, occupying eight rooms. Stanley’s father was now a wharfman. Stanley, then 15, was a ‘forwarder’ (he undertook the processes following sewing and including covering) and older brother Walter a ‘finisher’ in the bookbinding trade.

Stanley volunteered in the first days of November 1914, travelling to Brighton to join a newly formed cyclist battalion, the 2nd/6th battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment. His original service number was 920. The battalion had converted to infantry by November 1915 and on 4 February 1916 sailed from Devonport to India. Stanley’s death in 1917 was not combat related.

He had nominated his father as next of kin and sole legatee. George Williamson received his son’s war gratuity and medals in 1919 and 1920. Stanley’s parents lived at 4 St Martin’s Road, close to the site of the Stockwell Memorial, for around a decade after the Great War.

Henry Thomas Weatherley

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H. T. Weatherley
Service no. 4712
Private, London Regiment, 24th Battalion
Died on 24 January 1916, aged about 21
CWGC: “Son of Mr A. Weatherley, of 25 Aylesford Road, Stockwell, London.”
Remembered at Noeux-les-Mines Communal Cemetery, France

This is a tentative identification. I have not seen any data that relates “H.T. Weatherley” on the memorial with Henry Thomas Weatherley living at 158 Larkhall Lane in 1911. However, they both have Mr. A. Weatherley as a father – and I have not found any other H.T. Weatherleys in the area at that time.

Information from the 1911 census

Henry Thomas Weatherley was 14 and out of work in 1911. He lived with his parents, Alfred Weatherley, 45, a painter from Uxbridge, and Elizabeth Jane Weatherley (née Taylor), 45, from Maldon, Essex, at 158 Larkhall Lane, where the family had five rooms. Three siblings lived at home (one was elsewhere; one had died): Alfred Henry Weatherley, 21, a gas fitter born in Brixton, William Edward Weatherley, 18, a boot repairer; Eva May Weatherley, 11. Jack John Weatherley, a married baker, father of nine, and brother to Alfred, lived with the family, as did Malcolm John Morgan, a 30-year-old married boot repairer from Clapham.

William Childs Wadmore

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C. W. Wadmore
Service no. R/31892
Rifleman, King’s Royal Rifle Corps, 10th Battalion
Born in Stockwell; enlisted in Camberwell
Killed in action on 9 January 1917, aged about 21
Remembered at Sailly-Saillisel British Cemetery, Somme, France

Identification

I believe there is an error on the memorial. I can find no trace of a C. W. Wadmore, but there is evidence that a W. C. Wadmore lived in Stockwell at the appropriate time. In addition, the Soldiers Died in the Great War database includes a William Childs Wadmore, born in Stockwell. Further evidence that a Wadmore family lived in Stockwell includes a parish register recording the baptism in 1892 of Elizabeth Wadmore, daughter of William and Eliza Wadmore of 7 Bromsgrove Road, at St Andrew’s Church, Stockwell.

James Trace

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J. Trace
Service no. 8867
Rifleman, London Regiment (Queen’s Westminster Rifles), 1st/16th Battalions
Enlisted in Westminster; lived in Brixton
Killed in action on 1 July 1916, aged about 21
Remembered at Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France

Information from the censuses

James Trace was an office boy for a firm of solicitors. He shared four rooms at 70b Hackford Road, Stockwell with his parents and siblings. His father, unemployed cab driver John Trace, 59, was from Torbryan, Devon; his mother, Lucy Trace, 51, was from Leicestershire. Three other children lived at home: Maude Trace, 20, a dressmaker; William Trace, 18, like James a solicitor’s office boy;  and Arthur Trace, 14, an errand boy. There were seven other siblings.

James was baptised at St John the Divine, Kennington, on 4 September 1895, when his parents lived at 116 Cowley Road. At that time his father described himself as an ostler (he looked after horses at an inn).