British Casualties - 22nd August 1914

The following twelve men all died on the 22nd August 1914, the day before the British Army met the German Army head on at Mons. Today, one hundred years ago, really was the calm before the storm.

Remembering today, one hundred years on:

T/19561 Driver Charles Barnecutt, Army Service Corps (died at Home)
Lieutenant Charles George Gordon Bayly, Royal Flying Corps
9495 Lance-Corporal Walter Barraclough, Northumberland Fusiliers (died, France & Flanders)
7531 Private Lionel Alfred Beare, Dorsetshire Regiment (killed in action, France & Flanders)
4494 Lance-Corporal Thomas Dunn, 2nd Dragoons (killed in action, France & Flanders)
6910 Pte Lawrence Gallagher, 2nd Royal Irish Regiment (killed in action, France & Flanders)
10691 Pte Stephen Kennedy, 2nd Connaught Rangers (died of wounds, France & Flanders)
2549 Corporal Thomas George Neighbour, 1st Life Guards (killed in action, France & Flanders)
1442 Pte Austin Noland, 4th King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry (died at Home)
6271 Pte William Porter, 1st Norfolk Regiment (died, France & Flanders)
Lieutenant George Masterman Thompson, Royal Scots (killed in action, Togoland)
Vincent Waterfall (killed in action, France & Flanders)

Private Austin Noland died when he was hit by a train while guarding Newark's tubular bridge. He lived long enough to explain that he and his sergeant had not heard the train approaching because of the rattling of a goods train going in the opposite direction. An account of this incident is reproduced on Trevor Frecknall's Great War Bulletin website.

Private William Porter was a Norfolk man living in Chelmsford, Essex. His house in Arbour Lane, Springfield is only a stone's throw from where I'm typing this and as well as being the first Norfolk Regiment casualty, he was also the first Chelmsford casualty. His death though, is still something of a mystery. He was posted missing on 22nd August 1914 and not officially reported as killed in action until 1916. He is remembered on the Excellent Chelmsford War Memorial website from where I have borrowed the image that illustrates this post.

I mentioned Vincent Waterfall the other day in my post about Lieutenant Charles George Gordon Bayly. Both men were killed instantly when their plane was shot down on 22nd August 1914, although Bayly's death is given incorrectly by Soldiers Died in The Great War as 20th August.

At the going down of the sun, and in the morning, WE WILL REMEMBER THEM.