Stockwell War Memorial

Friends of Stockwell War Memorial & Gardens

KIA

Thomas James Woodley

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T. J. Woodley
Service no. 203597
Private, Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry, 1st/4th Battalion; formerly 2725, Royal Buckinghamshire Hussars
Born in Deptford; enlisted in London; lived in Clapham
Killed in action on 15 June 1918, aged 29
CWGC: “Husband of Mrs E. Woodley, of 14 Glenelg Road, Acre Lane, Brixton, London.”
Remembered at Boscon British Cemetery, Italy and St Andrew’s Church, Landor Road, London SW9

Brother-in-law to Arthur Worby

Information from the censuses

Printer’s labourer Thomas James Woodley, 23 in 1911, lived at 6 Edithna Street, Stockwell, where his family occupied six rooms. The other members of the household were his widowed mother, Rosa Ann Woodley, 55, from Southwark; siblings Susan Elizabeth Woodley, 28, a blouse hand, Beatrice Amelia Woodley, 27, a dressmaker, George Thomas Woodley, 25, a printer’s labourer, William Woodley, 19, a shop assistant, Henry Woodley, 17, a shop assistant. Two other siblings lived elsewhere, and three had died.

Ethel Maude Woodley
Ethel Maude Woodley

Information from Howard Anderson

Thomas James Woodley was a career soldier, formerly a regular in the Royal Bucks Hussars before being killed whilst serving with the Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry during the Battle of Asiago fighting the Austrians. He was the brother-in-law of Arthur Worby, having married Worby’s sister Ethel Maude Worby.

Howard Anderson writes: “There is an added poignancy about the names on the memorial. T. J. Woodley is right next to A. Worby, close in stone and in life, they were brothers-in-law. Thomas married Arthur Worby’s sister Ethel Maude Worby but was killed just 18 months later. Although she married again, it ruined her life. I remember her as a sad old lady.”

Howard Anderson, great-nephew to Arthur
Visit 1stmiddlesex.com

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.

Sidney Charles Withey

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S. C. Withey
Service no. 490673
Serjeant, London Regiment, 2nd/13th Kensington Battalion
Enlisted in Kensington; lived in Brixton
Killed in action on 8 December 1917, aged about 22
Remembered at Jerusalem War Cemetery, Israel and St Andrew’s Church, Landor Road, London SW9

Information from the censuses

Insurance clerk Sidney Charles Withey lived at 14 Dalyell Road, Brixton with his parents and six siblings. His father, William Henry Withey, 46, was a travelling salesman for grocery products, born in Yeovil, Somerset. His mother, Louisa Emily (née Hutchings), 45, was from Camden Town, north London. Seven of their 10 children survived. Ethel Louisa Withey, 24, a dressmaker, and William James Withey, 24, a commercial clerk, were born in Kennington. Leonard Robert, 14, an accountant’s clerk, Ernest George Withey, 12, Mary Victoria, 10, Maud Alexandra, 9, and Sidney Charles were born in Stockwell. The family lived in six rooms and had lived at this address since at least 1901.

Bertram Horace Winter

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B. H. Winter
Service no. S/15614
Rifleman, Rifle Brigade, 13th Battalion
Enlisted in Lambeth; lived in Clapham
Killed in action on 11 April 1917, aged 27
CWGC: “Son of Mrs A. Winter, of 19 Prideaux Road, Landor Road, Stockwell, London.”
Remembered at Arras Memorial, France

British Army Service Records 1914-1920

Milkman (and former butcher) Bertram Horace Winter signed up at the Whitehall recruiting office on 15 February 1916. He lasted 273 days before he died at Arras on 11 April 1917. The details of his service are scant – we know that he embarked for the 3rd Battalion on 3 July 1916 and was posted to the 13th Battalion on 20 July. He stood 5 feet 4½ inches tall, with a 34½-inch chest (he could expand it by 2½ inches), and weighed a little over 8½ stone. His physical development was judged “good”. Bertram’s widowed mother Augusta was named as next of kin. She lived at 25 Viceroy Road, South Lambeth.

Information from the censuses

In 1911 Bertram Horace Winter was working as a butcher’s assistant. He lived at 147 Larkhall Lane, over the shop, with butcher Albert Henry and his wife Lydia Eliza Henry, both 41, a childless couple. Meanwhile, Bertram’s parents, William Charles Winter, 59, a paper hanger and house decorator and his wife Augusta Winter (née Sexton), 58, both Lambeth-born, lived at 31 Courland Grove, Stockwell. Of their 12 children, 7 survived, with four living at home: Frederick W. Winter, 28, a paper hanger and painter; Emily Elizabeth Winter, 26, a dress and mantle maker; Arthur Thomas Winter, 26, a paper hanger and painter; Walter Winter, 25, a porter for a tailor shop. All were born in Clapham. The Winter family had lived at this address since at least 1901.

Henry Williams

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H. Williams
Lance Corporal, London Regiment, 23rd Bn.
Service no. 4180
Killed in action on 18 July 1916, aged about 39
Remembered at Cabaret-Rouge British Cemetery, Souchez, France

Henry Williams was born in Lambeth in about 1879. There are no clues to his early life apart from the fact he was named after his father, who was a soldier. Henry Williams was 19 when he married Frances Matilda Oliffe, a domestic servant of the same age, at St John the Evangelist, Walworth, on 10 Apr 1898. The marriage was not witnessed by relatives of either Henry or Frances, who was only able to make her mark at the time of the wedding. By the time of the 1901 census, Henry and Matilda had two young children, Frances 3 and Harry 1. They lived in a single room at 5 Northall Street, Stockwell. A property that housed ten other people in four rooms. ( https://booth.lse.ac.uk/map/18/-0.1235/51.4700/100/1 )

There were two more children in the Williams family when Henry completed his 1911 census return. Neatly listed by age, they were Elizabeth Franc [sic] Williams 13, Harry Williams 11, Ada Williams 8 and Thomas Williams just 10 months old. Henry appears to have misjudged the space on the form, shortening the middle name of both his daughter and his wife whose name was written as “Matilda Franc Williams”. Henry was now 32 and working as a “coal porter” and Matilda was 31. The family lived in just two rooms at 35 Lingham Street, Stockwell, a property which also housed an elderly couple living in one room and a family of six living in three rooms. Their youngest son was baptised “Thomas Edward George” at St Andrew, Stockwell Green, on 2 September 1914 when the family had moved to 7 Stockwell Cottages.

Henry Williams made the critical decision to volunteer in May 1915, a time when renewed recruitment campaigns across London were attempting to boost the dwindling numbers of volunteers. The campaigns often emphasised the pay and allowances for married men which may have swayed Henry. He went to 27, St John’s Hill, Clapham Junction on Wednesday 19 May 1915 to join the 23rd Battalion of the London Regiment, part of the Territorial Force. Henry was 38 years old, 5ft 6 inches tall with a 37 inch chest and physically fit. He signed the agreement to serve overseas which all TF soldiers were asked to make there and then at Clapham Junction and was posted to the 3rdreserve of the 23rdLondon as private 4180, Williams H. Henry was not drafted to France until October 1915, embarking from Southampton on Saturday 9th October andjoined his unit by 14 October 1915. Henry was one of 78 men noted to have joined the battalion on a day when they were in billets in the Loos sector. The battalion stayed in the Loos sector until they moved to the Souchez sector in May 1916. In July they were south of Lens near Vimy. The keeper of the battalion’s war dairy simply noted that 7 men were killed and 8 wounded when in the front line on 18 July 1916. Henry Williams had been promoted to unpaid Lance Corporal on 16.7.16, just two days before he was killed in action.

Henry’s pocket book with letters, cards and photos was returned to his wife in October 1916, a year after her husband had first gone to France. Frances Matilda Williams was now living at 4 Bricknell Place, an alley off the south-west side of Stockwell Road, close to the Plough Public house on the corner of Stockwell Road and Stockwell Green. Henry’s widow Frances Matilda was subsequently informed she had been awarded a weekly pension of 21 shillings for herself and her two youngest children with effect from 29 January 1917.

Matilda Frances and her son Thomas were still living at 4 Bricknell Place in the 1930s.

John Wilkin

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J. Wilkin
Service no. 17677
Private, Royal Fusiliers, 12th Battalion
Born in Lambeth; enlisted in Southwark
Killed in action on 16 August 1916, aged 24
Remembered at Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France

National Roll of the Great War 1914-1918

WILKIN, J., Private, Royal Fusiliers.
He volunteered in June 1915, and in September of that year proceeding to the Western Front, was in action in the Battle of Loos, and in various other important engagements. He gave his life for King and Country in August 1916, during the first Battle of the Somme, and was entitled to the 1914-15 Star, the General Service and Victory Medals.
“His life for his Country.”
26 Wyvil Road, South Lambeth Road, S.W.8.

ohn Wilkin enlisted in Southwark in June 1915, and in September was sent to the front. He saw action in the Battle of Loos and died in August 1916, during the first Battle of the Somme. He lived at
26 Wyvil Road, off South Lambeth Road.

The 1911 census shows John Wilkin in Lambeth, a 19-year-old flour mill labourer who was one of 13 children of flour mill worker Robert Wilkin, 45, and Annie Amelia (née Ellis), 46, who at that time lived at 48 Commercial Road, Waterloo.

On 19 June 1915 John Wilkin married Violet Edith Baker,  at St Barnabas, South Kennington, who was awarded a weekly pension of 10s after John’s death.