Stockwell War Memorial

Friends of Stockwell War Memorial & Gardens

KIA

Richard James Marshall

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R. J. Marshall
Service no. L/40226
Serjeant, Royal Field Artillery, “B” Bty. 186th Bde.
Born in Clapham; enlisted at Camberwell
Killed in action at age 45 on 24 March 1918
CWGC: “Husband of Charlotte Jane Marshall, of 22 Love Lane, Stockwell, London.”
Remembered at Pozieres Memorial, France and on the war shrine at St Michael’s Church, Stockwell Park Road, London SW9 0DA

Information from the 1911 census

Richard James Marshall, 39 in 1911, was a commercial coachman. He was born in Clapham and lived with his wife Waterloo-born Charlotte Jane Marshall, 39 at 6 Eastcote Street, Stockwell, where they had 4 rooms. They had 2 surviving children (of 3): Dorothy Ena Marshall, 2, born in Clapham; Gladys Edith Marshall, 3, born in Stockwell.

Frederick Albert Marsh

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F.A. Marsh
Rifleman, Royal Irish Rifles, 12 Bn.
Service no. 43355
Died 15 August 1917, aged 18
Remembered at Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium

Chris Burge writes:

erick Albert Marsh was baptised on 26 February 1899 at St Mary Magdalene, Bermondsey, where his parents, Frederick Edwin Marsh, a railway goods shunter, and Frances Ellen Banks, had married just over a year earlier. By the time of the 1901 census, Frederick’s younger sister Ellen Frances was five months old and the family of four had moved to 8 Gaskell Street, off Union Road, in Stockwell. Engine driver William Meads’ family of eight lived at the same address. 

The 1911 census shows Frederick and Ellen Marsh had three children: Frederick Albert, 12, Ellen Francis, 10 and John Edwin, six. The family lived in five rooms at 37 Priory Grove. A family of four occupied two other rooms at the same address. Frederick’s father described his occupation as railway servant. 

Frederick Snr  had been employed by the London & South Western Railway since 1888, working as a shunter at Nine Elms. He was promoted yard foreman by 1907 and by 1912 his weekly wages were 38 shillings. The railways would be vital to the war effort and employees of the L&SWR were issued with a special war service badge. 

If Frederick and Ellen thought their son Frederick was too young to fight in this war, they were mistaken. With or without their consent, in the first week of June 1915, aged just 16, he volunteered at 9 Tufton Street, the administrative headquarters of the 2nd London Regiment. New recruits joined the 4th/2nd Battalion, the training reserve. Frederick was now private 4616 Marsh. 

Some underage recruits were weeded out before transfer to the 1st/2nd, or reported underage on landing in France, but Frederick seems to have remained in the Regiment, in England, until November 1916, when he was part of a large transfer of men to the 12th Irish Rifles and renumbered rifleman 43355 Marsh. A draft of around a hundred men sailed from Southampton to Le Havre on 11 November 1916, joining the 12th Royal Irish Rifles at the front near Messines two weeks later. After months of trench-holding, Frederick was with the 12th Royal Irish Rifles during the attack at Messines in early June and at Ypres in July and August, when heavy rain and constant shelling turned the battlefield into a hideous morass. On 15 August the battalion was readying for a 4.45am zero-hour attack the following day. Frederick was killed when their position was shelled.

Frederick’s parents were still at 37 Priory Grove when his father died in 1934. His mother passed away in 1949, aged 77. 

Frederick Marlow

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F. Marlow
Service no. 2999
Private, London Regiment, 1st/13th Kensington Battalion
Born in Lambeth; enlisted in Kensington; lived in Brixton
Killed in action on 9 May 1915, aged about 20
CWGC: “Son of Mrs C. Marlow, of 15, Stansfield Road, Stockwell Road, Stockwell, London.”
Remembered at Ploegsteert Memorial, Belgium, at Caxton House, Tothill Street, London SW1 and at St Andrew’s Church, Landor Road, London SW9

Memorial showing Frederick Marlow's name (middle of middle column
The original memorial showing Frederick Marlow’s name (middle of third column

Information from BERR.gov.uk
(Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform)

Before Frederick Marlow enlisted in the army, he was an abstractor in the Board of Trade – Labour Department (Central Office). He appears on a Board of Trade staff listed dated April 1913 as one of 47 Abstractors (New Class) in the Labour Exchanges and Unemployment Insurance Branch. The date of his appointment was 29 May 1912 (from when his pension accrued) and his salary was £45. He is remembered on the new war memorial plaque, unveiled in BERR’s headquarters at 1 Victoria Street, London SW1, on 11 November 2002, a replacement for a Roll of Honour to staff of the Board of Trade who fell in the First World War. (The original has been missing for many years.) Marlow is also commemorated on the Memorial to the Staff of the Ministry of Labour, now hanging in Caxton House, Tothill Street, London SW1.

British Army WWI Service Records 1914-1920
Frederick Marlow’s brother George also served in the Army (London Regiment, 15th Battalion). He described himself as a clerk at the Admiralty. The records show that he stood over 6 feet tall. He was discharged in late September 1918 as no longer physically fit for War Service (he suffered a gunshot wound to the left wrist).

Information from the censuses

In 1911 Frederick Marlow was a 16-year-old “boy clerk” working for the civil service. He lived at 15 Stansfield Road, Stockwell, with his parents, John Marlow, 53, a joiner from Twickenham, and mother Catherine Marlow, 51, from Gypsy Hill. The occupied 6 rooms. The couple had had 6 children, with 5 surviving:
Catherine Marlow, 21, a dressmaker, born in Kennington
William Marlow, 20, an accountant clerk for the civil service, born in Battersea
Henry Marlow, 18, like his brother Frederick a boy clerk for the civil service, born in Battersea
Frederick Marlow, 16, born in Brixton
George Marlow, 14, a boy messenger for the civil service, born in Brixton
The family is found at the same address 10 years previously.
George Marlow, 4, born in Brixton

Charles Thomas Markham

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C. T. Markham
Service no. 232431
Private, London Regiment (Royal Fusiliers), 2nd Battalion, also Royal Fusiliers, attd. 7th Battalion
Born in Wandsworth; enlisted in Clapham; lived in Lambeth
Killed in action on 6 April 1918, aged 21
Remembered at Pozieres Memorial, France

Charles Thomas Markham (courtesy of Pat Norris)

Information from the 1911 census

This identification is somewhat tentative. We do not have a year of birth for Charles Thomas Markham.
In 1911 a Charles Markham, born in Wandsworth, was living at 75a Ellerslie Road, Clapham. He was 16 and working as a grocer’s shop assistant. The household included his father, William Markham, 46, a carpenter and joiner from Framingham, Suffolk, and his mother, Mary Ann Markham, 45, from Holburn, London. They had had 8 children, 6 surviving. Apart from Charles there were 3 children living at home: Jessie Markham, 12, born in Stockwell; Sidney Markham, 7, born in Clapham; and Stanley Markham, 4, born in Stockwell.

Albert Marjeram

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A. Marjeram
Service no. 232420
Private, London Regiment (Royal Fusiliers), 2nd/2nd Battalion
Born in Brixton; enlisted in Lambeth; lived in Lambeth
Killed in action on 20 December 1917 at age 21
CWGC: “Son of William Marjeram, of 2 Kibworth Street, Dorset Road, Clapham, London, and the late Ruth Marjeram.”
Remembered at Tyne Cot Memorial, Belgium

Information from the 1911 census

In 1911 Albert Marjoram, then 15, worked as a van guard for the London & South West Railway. He lived with his family in 3 rooms at 2 Kibworth Street, Dorset Road. His father, William Marjoram, 55, was a night watchman born in Lambeth. His mother, Ruth Marjoram, 54, was from Manchester. The couple had had 15 children, of whom 7 had not survived. Three lived at home:
Elizabeth Marjoram, 21, an ironer, born in South Lambeth
James Marjoram, 19, born in South Lambeth, no occupation given
Albert Marjoram, 15, a van guard, born in South Lambeth
The census lists the family as “Marjoram”.
Albert Marjeram’s older brother William Marjeram, 36, a coal man, lived at 8 Alfred Court, South Lambeth, with his wife, Florence, and his four children.

Google trivia: There was another, rather more famous, Albert Marjeram, who was hanged in 1930 at Pentonville for the murder of Edith May Parker.

Arthur Stanley Manning

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A. S. Manning
Service no. 60740
Wheeler, Royal Horse Artillery and Royal Field Artillery
Born in Lambeth
Killed in action in Egypt on 23 December 1915, aged about 25
Remembered at Kut War Cemetery, to the north of Baghdad, Iraq
CWGC: The entry for A. S. Manning gives 25 December 1915 as date of death and states that he was of Indian nationality, a Gunner with the Madras Artillery Volunteers, 2nd (Madras) Group Garrison Artillery (The Duke’s Own).

Arthur Stanley Manning was a career soldier. He enlisted in the Royal Horse and Royal Field Artillery on 9 December 1909 at 88 New Kent Road, having previously worked as a printer’s engineer and served an apprenticeship. At the time of enlistment Manning was 19, 5 feet 7½ inches tall and weighed just over 9¾ stone. His chest measurement was 36 inches. His eyes were blue and his hair was brown.

Manning’s war career was short: he was killed in action on 25 December 1915 at Kut-al-Amarah in the Persian Gulf. He had served a total of 6 years and 15 days.

However, his work as a battery wheeler was solid. At the time he renewed his commitment to the army on 11 December 1914, he had gained two good conduct badges and his character was described as “very good.” After Manning died his sister, Mrs. May Adelaide Parsons, who lived  at 9 Meadow Road, received a registered letter from the Records office at Dover enclosing a letter from the Viceroy of India: “I am […] to forward the enclosed letter from his Excellency the Viceroy […] of transmission to the next-of-kin of the late No. 60740 Bombardier Manning RGA with the Volunteer Battery in Mesopotamia, who was killed in action on 25 December 1915.” Unfortunately, a copy of the Viceroy’s letter is not in the file.

On 1 March 1916 the War Office requested a copy of Manning’s Record of Service “showing the Indian period” and later Lieutenant E. F. Durand, on behalf of the adjutant General of India, sent a letter of condolence to May.

Manning was one of at least six children of James L. B. Manning, a machine operator born in Holborn, and Mary Manning, born in Lambeth.

Information from the 1901 census

Arthur Manning was 10 and living with his family at 9 Meadow Road. His father, James L. B. Manning, 46, was a “machine ruler” (machine operator) born in Holborn. His mother, Mary A. Manning, 45, was born in Lambeth. Their children at the time were:
Sidney J. Manning, 22, was a printer
Louise Elizabeth Manning, 20, a seamstress
Annie R. Manning, 18, was a pager for a bookbinder
George B. Manning, 13
Arthur S. Manning, 10,
May A. Manning, 4
All the children apart from the youngest two were born in Bermondsey.