200732 SERGEANT ARTHUR GEORGE EVERSON
MILITARY MEDAL
‘C’ COMPANY, 1/4TH BATTALION SUFFOLK REGIMENT
KILLED IN ACTION
23RD APRIL 1917
AGE 31 YEARS
Arthur George Everson was born on the 8th November 1886. At the time of his birth, his parents John, a teamster on a farm, and Laura (née Woods), were living and working in Loddon, Norfolk although they both hailed from Thorndon in mid-Suffolk. At the time of the 1901 Census the family, now with four children, remained living in Loddon. Arthur the eldest child, having left school, was now employed as a grocer’s assistant. Just two years later tragedy struck the family when John died at the age of forty-three. Although Laura and the two youngest children remained in Loddon, as shown in the 1911 Census, nothing could be located regarding Arthur at that time. The next occasion he could be found within official records shows that he had married Naomi Miriam Crisp in the district of Forhoe, Norfolk during the first quarter of 1914. It must have been shortly after their wedding that they had moved to the area around Halesworth as their only child, a son named George, was born in the district on the 29th September 1914. What employment Arthur had found in the town is not known, but the Gale’s Almanacks for Halesworth in 1915 and 1916 list him living at 38 Quay Street. It is possible that, due to his occupation shown on the 1901 Census, he could well have been working in one of the local grocery stores.
With the outbreak of war in August 1914, many of the local men volunteered to serve in the armed forces. The Halesworth Times newspaper of the 11th November listed over thirty townsmen who had enlisted during the previous week. Among them was one A.G. Everson who had signed to serve in the local “F” Halesworth Company of the 1/4th Battalion, Suffolk Regiment. This was in the very same week that the pre-war members of the 4th Suffolks had crossed to France during the night of the 8/9th November, becoming one of the first part-time Territorial battalions having volunteered to do so. Over the following eighteen or so weeks, Arthur, now serving as a Private soldier with the early regimental number of 2899, along with other men from his intake, were being trained in the art of becoming a soldier. In the meantime, those who had led the way from the Suffolk Territorials had received their baptism of fire during the Battle of Givenchy which had been fought over the 20th and 21st December 1914, followed, in mid-March 1915, by the Battle of Neuve Chapelle where the Regimental History later reported that the Battalion had suffered a total of two hundred and seventeen casualties. For the 4th Suffolks to continue to function as a front-line formation, these losses had to be made good. Therefore, in preparation for further expected casualty figures on the 1st March, Arthur was one of a group of casualty replacements sent out to France.
For the record of Arthur’s service while in France and up until he was posted as missing on St Georges Day 1917, there is no better source of information than the 4th Suffolk’s records, held in the County Record Office at Bury St Edmunds. These show that within six weeks of joining the battalion he had suffered a gunshot wound to the back of his neck on the 26th April 1915. After receiving treatment he returned to his comrades on the 18th May. Exactly a month later he received his first promotion to that of Lance Corporal. Shortly after this Arthur received a second gunshot wound, this time to the scalp. At this period of the war these wounds were quite common, that is up until the British Tommies began to be issued with steel helmets, which had been patented in 1915. After Arthur had received his latest wound, he had been admitted to No. 7 Casualty Clearing where he remained for ten days before returning to his comrades in ‘A’ Company. On the 30th November he had been readmitted to the Field Hospital with a bout of sickness and on being released back to his battalion he was granted eight days home leave from the 9th to the 16th December. Whether he returned to Halesworth is not known. Back in France, the new year of 1916 brought further promotion for Arthur, with him being made acting Corporal and being posted to the battalion’s ‘D’ Company. This promotion was made substantive on the 27th February. However, his talents as a fine leader of his men had been recognised as, on that very same day, he had been made a Sergeant, now in ‘C’ Company. This rapid advance in rank had not only been caused by his high standing within the battalion, but also by another Halesworth Territorial Sergeant, Percy Adams, a blacksmith of Chediston Street, having been returned to England suffering from bronchial pneumonia. On the 2nd May 1916 his rank of Sergeant was confirmed as now being substantive. This would have meant that his rate of pay would have increased to approximately 2s 8d (£0. 13p) per day. At some time between being promoted and September 1916 Arthur had been recommended for the award of a Military Medal. This Gallantry award could possibly have been for his actions during the fighting for High Wood during the Somme battle. First instituted in March 1916, it was to credit those other ranks for individual acts of bravery of a level below that of the existing Distinguished Conduct Medal, and the ultimate award for gallantry the Victoria Cross. Arthur’s M.M. was confirmed in the London Gazette of the 24th October 1916. Just a month later, when the 4th Suffolks were out of the line and resting in the area around the village of Huchenneville, Major General Pinney, the Commander of the 33rd Division who at that time the battalion were serving under, presented Arthur, along with a further eight of his comrades, with the medal ribbon of the M.M. to be worn above the left breast pocket of their uniform tunic. This would have been in lieu of the actual medal which they would have received at a later date.
The new year of 1917 found the 4th Suffolks carrying out three weeks of training in very cold conditions, before moving back into the firing line where, over the early months of the year, they were involved in minor actions and trench raids, much of which was carried out over frozen, snow-covered ground. On the 22nd April, they relieved 20th Royal Fusiliers in trenches that had previously been a section of the German Hindenburg line. This was in preparation for a major assault to be launched on the enemy the following day. Zero hour had been fixed for 4.45 am with the British troops attacking over a front some nine miles in length. Initially the assault went very well, with over seventy prisoners and a number of machine guns captured by the Suffolks. By 9.30 am Arthur, with his ‘C’ and the 4th Suffolks ‘D’ Company, had advanced and secured a section of the German front line supported by a single tank. They then pushed on until they had reached a sunken road, where they were held up by heavy enemy fire. At 2.00 pm the Germans mounted a strong counter-attack where they managed to outflank the two Suffolk companies and re-enter their own trench, cutting off the line of withdrawal for the men in the sunken road who were then unable to retire. Many of them were then made prisoners of war. What remained of the 4th Suffolks managed to reach the safety of their own lines by 5.30 pm, when the roll would have been called. The battle that had lasted less than twenty-four hours had cost the Battalion dear with one Officer and forty-one Other Ranks confirmed as being killed and almost one hundred and seventy all ranks wounded with a further one hundred and four men posted as missing, among them Arthur.
Over the following months his folks at home, not knowing his fate, obviously became more concerned. At some time his mother Laura, now living in Denmark Road, Beccles, must have heard that relatives were able to make enquiries regarding loved ones who had been listed as missing through the International Red Cross at their Headquarters in Switzerland. Their staff, after liaising with the German authorities, located the men who had been with Arthur during the battle at a Prisoner of War Camp at Wittenberg in Saxony. One of them, Private Albert Bacon, another Halesworth Territorial, gave the following written statement regarding Arthur:
A.151504 (Dec 1917)
From Pte A Bacon 200276 same Regt at Willenberg – “On the 23rd of April I was with Sgt Everson, 5 minutes before I was taken prisoner, at that time, we were getting shelled heavily. I saw about 60 of our men after I was captured and they were asking where Sgt Everson was, and not one knew, so we all gave him up as killed. He was a townsman of mine and also very popular in the Battalion, so everyone knew him.”
In the 1911 Census, Albert Bacon was shown as living in Chediston Street, with his occupation listed as grocer’s errand boy. It is therefore possible that they had both worked together in one of the town’s grocers shops. The census also shows Albert’s age as being thirteen years. This reinforces the story that, on the night the 4th Suffolks sailed for France, several of the younger soldiers celebrated their nineteenth birthday, this being the lowest age at which a British soldier could go to war. In truth Albert was just seventeen.
On receiving the news of Arthur’s possible death, he was then posted as presumed killed. His wife Naomi, was then able to claim a war widow’s pension for which she received for herself and young son George in the sum of £1.1s.3d (£1.06p) per week. At this time she had left Halesworth and had moved back to her home village of Barnham Broom in Norfolk. In November 1919 Naomi was also awarded the final of two gratuity payments for the loss of her husband that together totalled £18 17s 10d (£18.89p).
After the battle in which Arthur lost his life, it would have been most likely that the Germans would have buried and marked his grave, for he now lies at rest in the Wancourt British Cemetery, France. As well as being named on both the Halesworth and Beccles War Memorials, his mother Laura also had his details listed in the booklet of Beccles Men who had served in the Great War. This had been produced in July 1920 by the local committee of the East Suffolk War Relief Fund. (See below)
As well as receiving both pension and war gratuity payments, Naomi would have also been able to claim medal entitlement of the Military Medal for Gallantry with his 1915 Star medal trio, memorial plaque and scroll.
The location of these is unknown.
