Category: Press Releases

1801 PRIVATE BERTIE RICHARD CALVER
‘C’ COMPANY 1/4^TH BATTALION SUFFOLK REGIMENT (T.F.)
KILLED IN ACTION
26^TH AUGUST 1915
AGED 18 YEARS

Born in Halesworth on the 9^th October 1896, Bertie was the third child of a family that would eventually reach a total of eight children.  His father Charles and mother Mary (née Clarke) ran a small fruiterers’ and market garden business in the town.  By 1911 the family had grown so large that they occupied two of the small four room cottages situated near the far end of Chediston Street in an area known as Rumsby’s Yard.  On leaving school in 1910 Bertie found employment at Mr Leckenby’s boot factory in Quay Street.  Described as a lad full of spirit, in late 1913 he followed his elder brother Hubert into enlisting in the town’s Territorials serving as No.1801 private soldier in ‘F’ Company at the age of seventeen years.  Like many of his pals, including his brother in ‘F’ Company, after the outbreak of war in August 1914 he signed the Imperial Service Pledge thereby volunteering to serve overseas around the time of his eighteenth birthday. 

Barely four months later they were preparing to cross to France when it was realised that the pre-war regulations still applied which meant the youngest age a soldier could travel overseas was nineteen years, it is said that the night before the 4^th Suffolks sailed on the 8^th November 1914 there were several men who celebrated their nineteenth birthdays Bertie being just one.  For the 1/4^th Suffolks the following few months consisted of further training and gaining front line experience where they became involved in a number of minor engagements as they prepared for their first major action.  This would come during the battle of Neuve Chapelle between the 10^th and 13^th March 1915.  Bertie was not present as on the 5^th March 1915 he had been struck down with tonsillitis and had been admitted to the Canadian Field Hospital where he remained until the 17^th May after which he re-joined his battalion.  During his time away as well as the Neuve Chapelle action, the 1/4^th Suffolks had also fought during the battle of Aubers Ridge.  Their combined losses for both of these in Officers and Men amounted to well over three hundred all ranks being killed and wounded. 

Within six weeks of Bertie’s return to the 1/4^th Suffolks, the Regimental history, which was first published in 1927, records that on the 21^st June 1915, whilst the Battalion were still serving in the front line, they had been bombarded by a battery of German heavy artillery, during which one Officer and four Other Ranks had been killed, with a further three soldiers receiving wounds.  One of these had been Bertie, who had been grazed by a shell splinter to his lower stomach, for which he had been admitted into the 20^th British Field Ambulance and discharged two days later.

On 10^th July Bertie would have been present at a parade outside the town of Estaires when the Divisional Commander, Major General Keary, presented the ribbons of Gallantry medals to those of the battalion who had been awarded for their part in the battle of the previous March.  Like all the lads from Halesworth he no doubt would have been particularly proud of Percy Sones, as he had the ribbon of the Distinguished Conduct Medal pinned to his chest.  Just over a month later Bertie would be dead.  In a letter sent to his parents shortly after by the then ‘C’ Company Commander, Captain W.G. Tollemarche, expressing sympathy “for the loss of a very popular lad”, he mentioned that Bertie’s death was instantaneous.  This, combined with the fact that he was the only loss to the battalion on that day, could point to the fact that he had been shot by a German sniper or struck by a stray bullet, having attempted to look over the top of the trench.  After his death his comrades would have given him a field burial and sometime later his remains may have been transported to the Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery Cabaret-Rouge, outside the town of Souchez, France, where he now lies at rest.

After his death, his mother Mary having been nominated as his next of kin, received War Gratuities in the total of £8.10.4d (£8.52p) and a weekly pension of 5/- (25p).  She would also have received his medal awards of the 1914 Star Trio, Memorial Plaque and Scroll.

The present location of these is unknown.

Field Service Postcard sent to Bertie’s mum Mary by his older brother 1523 Private Hubert Calver 1/4^th Bn, Suffolk Regiment on the 1^st March 1915.

1801 PRIVATE BERTIE RICHARD CALVER
‘C’ COMPANY 1/4^TH BATTALION SUFFOLK REGIMENT (T.F.)
KILLED IN ACTION
26^TH AUGUST 1915
AGED 18 YEARS

Born in Halesworth on the 9^th October 1896, Bertie was the third child of a family that would eventually reach a total of eight children.  His father Charles and mother Mary (née Clarke) ran a small fruiterers’ and market garden business in the town.  By 1911 the family had grown so large that they occupied two of the small four room cottages situated near the far end of Chediston Street in an area known as Rumsby’s Yard.  On leaving school in 1910 Bertie found employment at Mr Leckenby’s boot factory in Quay Street.  Described as a lad full of spirit, in late 1913 he followed his elder brother Hubert into enlisting in the town’s Territorials serving as No.1801 private soldier in ‘F’ Company at the age of seventeen years.  Like many of his pals, including his brother in ‘F’ Company, after the outbreak of war in August 1914 he signed the Imperial Service Pledge thereby volunteering to serve overseas around the time of his eighteenth birthday. 

Barely four months later they were preparing to cross to France when it was realised that the pre-war regulations still applied which meant the youngest age a soldier could travel overseas was nineteen years, it is said that the night before the 4^th Suffolks sailed on the 8^th November 1914 there were several men who celebrated their nineteenth birthdays Bertie being just one.  For the 1/4^th Suffolks the following few months consisted of further training and gaining front line experience where they became involved in a number of minor engagements as they prepared for their first major action.  This would come during the battle of Neuve Chapelle between the 10^th and 13^th March 1915.  Bertie was not present as on the 5^th March 1915 he had been struck down with tonsillitis and had been admitted to the Canadian Field Hospital where he remained until the 17^th May after which he re-joined his battalion.  During his time away as well as the Neuve Chapelle action, the 1/4^th Suffolks had also fought during the battle of Aubers Ridge.  Their combined losses for both of these in Officers and Men amounted to well over three hundred all ranks being killed and wounded. 

Within six weeks of Bertie’s return to the 1/4^th Suffolks, the Regimental history, which was first published in 1927, records that on the 21^st June 1915, whilst the Battalion were still serving in the front line, they had been bombarded by a battery of German heavy artillery, during which one Officer and four Other Ranks had been killed, with a further three soldiers receiving wounds.  One of these had been Bertie, who had been grazed by a shell splinter to his lower stomach, for which he had been admitted into the 20^th British Field Ambulance and discharged two days later.

On 10^th July Bertie would have been present at a parade outside the town of Estaires when the Divisional Commander, Major General Keary, presented the ribbons of Gallantry medals to those of the battalion who had been awarded for their part in the battle of the previous March.  Like all the lads from Halesworth he no doubt would have been particularly proud of Percy Sones, as he had the ribbon of the Distinguished Conduct Medal pinned to his chest.  Just over a month later Bertie would be dead.  In a letter sent to his parents shortly after by the then ‘C’ Company Commander, Captain W.G. Tollemarche, expressing sympathy “for the loss of a very popular lad”, he mentioned that Bertie’s death was instantaneous.  This, combined with the fact that he was the only loss to the battalion on that day, could point to the fact that he had been shot by a German sniper or struck by a stray bullet, having attempted to look over the top of the trench.  After his death his comrades would have given him a field burial and sometime later his remains may have been transported to the Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery Cabaret-Rouge, outside the town of Souchez, France, where he now lies at rest.

After his death, his mother Mary having been nominated as his next of kin, received War Gratuities in the total of £8.10.4d (£8.52p) and a weekly pension of 5/- (25p).  She would also have received his medal awards of the 1914 Star Trio, Memorial Plaque and Scroll.

The present location of these is unknown.

Field Service Postcard sent to Bertie’s mum Mary by his older brother 1523 Private Hubert Calver 1/4^th Bn, Suffolk Regiment on the 1^st March 1915.

10138 L/CPL CECIL HARRY ASHFORD
9^TH BATTALION SUFFOLK REGIMENT
WHO DIED OF WOUNDS
9^TH OCTOBER 1915
AGE 32 YEARS

Cecil, more commonly known as Harry, had been born in Framlingham in 1883 and was the second son and twin to sister Alice born to Sutton, jeweller and watchmaker and Louisa (née Simpson).  By the 1890s the family had moved to Halesworth, where Sutton had set up his watchmaker’s business at No. 8 London Road.  On leaving school Harry served his apprenticeship with the Halesworth Printers, Premier Press.  By 1911 he had qualified as a compositor and was employed by Messrs Flood and Sons in Lowestoft whilst lodging with the Press family.

At the start of the Great War in 1914, although the Royal Navy ruled the waves with the most powerful fleet afloat, the British regular army with many of its troops overseas, policing the Empire, were not in any state to fight a protracted war against Germany and her allies.  At this point the then Secretary for War, Lord Kitchener of Khartoum, announced the formation of a new citizen army to be based around men of a similar social class or walks of life, originating from the same town or village with similar interests such as being members  of the local football club etc.  These formations were originally known as ‘Pals Battalions’.  Shortly after Lord Kitchener’s call to arms (best illustrated by his well-known  poster of ‘Your Country Wants You’), Harry stepped forward to enlist in Lowestoft instantly to serve as 3/10138 a Private Soldier in the 3^rd (Reserve) Battalion, Suffolk Regiment then based in Felixstowe.  He was then posted to the 9^th (Service) Battalion of his county regiment.  The inclusion of ‘service’ in their title indicated that they were a Kitchener’s battalion, which had been first formed at Bury St Edmunds in September 1914.

As can be seen from the photograph of Harry taken before he crossed to France, due to the large number of men enlisting, standard khaki uniforms were not available.  In 1914, many of the new battalion’s soldiers would have been dressed in obsolete blue uniforms which they despised.  After completing training, during which he was promoted to L/Cpl he crossed to France with his battalion on the 30^th August 1915. 

Less than a month later, the 9^th Suffolks entered the fray, when they took part in their first action of the war, the Battle of Loos, which they with their comrades of the 24^th Division joined on the 25^th September 1915.  Initially forming up in the area of the northern French city of Bethune, their task was to carry out a follow up attack on the German support line, after the main assault had overrun the enemy’s front line.  Their order to advance came at 11.25 on the morning of the 26^th September whereupon each platoon of the battalion mounted the trench parapet and began to advance forward, whilst under a very heavy barrage being fired by the German artillery.  After making some two hundred yards, their advance gradually slowed and then ground to a halt as many of their inexperienced soldiers began to fall either dead or wounded.  Eventually the order to withdraw was given, with those able helping the injured to the rear.  From what information is available, it appears that Harry was one of those who had suffered wounds from which he eventually would die from on the 9^th October 1915.

For some time no official notification of Harry’s death was made to his family with them initially receiving the news from a comrade who helped to bury him.  As with many other cases during the ebb and flow of the Great War battles, Harry’s grave was lost with his name joining many thousands of others that are remembered on the Menin Gate Memorial to the missing in Belgium.

Shortly after, as their own memorial to their son’s life, the family arranged for an enamel sign to be produced to remember Harry’s sacrifice.  This it is believed was placed somewhere in the Halesworth Cemetery.  Many years later it was found in a hedge and handed into the Towns museum where it remains today.  As well as being remembered on the Halesworth War Memorial, his name is also to be found on the Framlingham Memorial and that at St Margaret’s Church, Lowestoft.

It was during the withdrawal that 3/10133 Sgt Arthur Saunders of the battalion became the first of two members of the Suffolk Regiment to win a Victoria Cross during the Great War.  Arthur who hailed from the parish of St. John’s, Ipswich must have enlisted on the same day as Harry as their regimental numbers are within four digits of each other.

After Harry’s death his father Sutton now living with his wife in Lowestoft, received a combined War Gratuity of £7.12s.6d (£7.63p) for the loss of their son.

He would have also been able to claim Harry’s medal entitlement of the 1915 Star medal trio with his named memorial plaque and scroll.

The location of these awards are not known.

J/27366 BOY SEAMAN 1^ST CLASS
WALTER BENJAMIN ADAMSON
H.M.S. HAWKE
LOST AT SEA 15^TH OCTOBER 1914
AGED 17 YEARS

Walter was the first and youngest of the Halesworth War Dead.  Born in the town on the 6^th November 1897, the second son of Samuel a brewers labourer and his wife Florence (née Watson) he went onto attend the Halesworth Boys School until the age of fourteen, when having completed his education he found work locally as a sack mender employed by Dennington and Co Ltd sack, rope and tent manufacturers of London Road.  No doubt he found the work menial and possibly finding his older brother Samuel’s stories of life at sea exciting.

In August 1913 Walter left the family home at No. 19 Chediston Street to join the Royal Navy enlisting as J/27366 Boy Seaman 2^nd Class, he first attended H.M.S. Ganges, the Boy’s Training School at Shotley in Suffolk.  Whilst there although described as a quiet lad he soon began to show great promise so much so that he was one of the twenty top students to receive their posting with the rank of Boy 1^st class.  On the 15^th April 1914 he joined his first and only ship the Edgar Class Cruiser H.M.S. Hawke launched in March 1891 by 1914 she was now considered rather old for a modern ship of the line.

At the outbreak of the Great War in August 1914 his ship was part of the Home Fleet patrolling the North Sea.  Thereon the 15^th October whilst in company with her sister ship H.M.S. Theseus she was torpedoed by the German Submarine U-9.  The Hawke sank in just a few minutes taking with her the Captain, twenty-six officers and four hundred and ninety-seven men and boys including poor Walter.  The Hawke was the latest sinking attributed to the U-9 having just a month previously accounted for three other British cruisers in the space of an hour.

After his loss Walter’s parents would have heard the sad news of his death at their new home at No. 63 London Road on the 23^rd October 1914.

As with the rest of his shipmates lost that day Walter is now remembered on the Chatham Memorial to the missing, unveiled in October 1924.

Due to his young age and the fact that his father was still alive, his parents would not have received any pension for their loss, although they were entitled to receive his medal entitlement of the 1915 Star medal trio and memorial plaque and scroll.

The location of these are unknown.

The existing building was built about 1901 after the previous building, together with the boot factory at the back of the building. Not only were these two buildings a number of cottages were also burnt.

MUSEUM VOLUNTEERS, TAKE A BOW

The Halesworth and District Museum was one of six finalists in the Suffolk Museum of the Year Awards announced in Ipswich on 21 October. Not bad considering how small a museum we are.  There were over 30 entrants and we came away, not winner (that’s next year!), but a well-appreciated runner-up. All that’s down to our terrific team of volunteers. Take a bow all of you.

We also have to give a great big thankyou to the team of very willing volunteers who turned up at the Museum on the 14th, rolled their sleeves up and got stuck in to the task of clearing our store room for the next new development in the Museum’s life . Thanks to their energy and willingness, the task was completed in a fraction of the time we’d allowed. Many thanks.

That move will allow us to start work on the next exciting phase in the Museum’s life, the creation of a Research Room where people will be able to come and pursue their interests in local history and family history. There will be computer access to lots of resources as well as the opportunity to use the extensive research collection of books, notes and photographs which the Museum has built up over the years. So watch this space for further news. In the meantime, the space gained gives us a chance to put on public display for the first time, some of the Museum’s extensive collection of historical pictures.

Thanks to our ever-supportive team of volunteers, we’ve taken the bold step this year of maintaining our summer opening times into the winter, doubling the number of hours. So until Friday 13 December, when we close for our ‘winter recess’, we shall still be open Tuesday to Saturday mornings, 10.00 – 12.30.

This year, we plan a Thankyou Tea for all our Volunteers and Friends, without whom none of this would be possible. Make a note in your diary if you’re one of our ‘Ring of Support’ and keep the afternoon of Saturday 23 November free. You’ll be hearing more from us.

And if there’s anyone out there wishing they were part of this award-winning team, do pop in and see us at the Museum or ring Brian Howard on 01986 875551 for a chat. There’s still room on the bus.

REMEMBER THE SEVENTIES?

Next year, the Halesworth area is set to go ever so slightly nuts about the 1970s.

Our Museum is celebrating the success of a Lottery bid which means that, for the next 12 months, it will be getting together with organization in the town and the villages around to look back at life as it was back then, when flares, platform heels, hot pants and droopy moustaches were the order of the day.

The Museum, along with ten others in Suffolk and Hertfordshire, will be able to use a share of a £247,000 grant secured by the Association for Suffolk Museums to fund research, exhibitions and events involving local community groups and individuals.

A team of volunteers will be delving into local newspapers, researching local photographs and talking to local people about life in the area forty years ago. They will also be organizing a series of events next year, featuring 70s food, fashions and music to recapture the mood of the time. The first will be in the upstairs gallery at Halesworth Library from 9-23 November (see the advertisement on this page).

At the heart of the Halesworth project is the huge collection of photographic negatives left to the Museum by local photographer Robbie Page. The Museum will be digitizing these and taking them out and about to spur people’s memories and build up an account of the times.

“We want the whole community to get involved in thinking back to the time of Abba, ‘The Good Life’ and the Silver Jubilee” says Project Co-ordinator, Vic Gray. We want to chart the changes in the area. This was the decade when the Swimming Pool, the Apollo Centre and Jubilee Court were opened in Halesworth and there was new housing going up all around. We want to do a serious piece of work, but we also want people to have some fun and get together to remember the taste and feel of the time.”

The Museum is hoping to recruit a group of volunteers from Halesworth and the surrounding villages to join the project team. Anyone interested – or anyone who was here in the ‘70s and would be happy to talk about those days – should ring Vic Gray on 01986 872437 or at office@halesworthmuseum.org.uk for a no-obligation chat about how they might be able to help.

THE BRONZE AGE IS BACK IN WISSETT

The long link between archaeology and beer will be celebrated in one Suffolk pub in October, when Wissett people will be the first to glimpse a remarkable part of their history, the oldest objects ever discovered in the village, and to celebrate the discovery with a new beer brewed specially for the occasion.

For just one day, the Halesworth and District Museum will be putting on display for the public six Bronze-Age axe heads found in a field near Wissett in 2011. The axe heads are 3,500 years old and show remarkable workmanship. There are hints that some of the axes, at least, were cast locally.

Purchased from the British Museum in 2012, they have been going through a painstaking conservation process for some months, essential to ensure their long-term condition. The Museum is in the process of designing a permanent display in a climatically controlled cabinet, costing in the region of £15,000. “Before they go into storage awaiting their permanent display,” explains Museum Chairman, Brian Holmes, “we felt we owed it to the people of Wissett to give them first sight of these magnificent, archaeologically important objects, in a place accessible to everyone in the village.”

The objects will be on view in the Wissett Plough, the village’s only pub, which has recently been widely praised for its new ‘nano-brewery’, producing a range of beers exclusively for customers of the Plough. ‘Wissett Bronze’ (4.4%) is being brewed with Munich and Crystal malts, to produce a mid-brown, bronze colour with Mosaic and Victoria Secret hops producing subtle mango, citrus, tropical fruits and bitterness, balanced with the biscuity, malt base. Landlord Nick Sumner comments: “A good beer is worth waiting for – but 3,500 years is a long enough wait by anyone’s standards. Its time has come.”

The Wissett Hoard will be on display at The Plough between 11a.m. and 8p.m. on Saturday 26 October.

Further information about the Hoards can be found on the Museum’s web site: http://halesworthmuseum.org.uk/wpress/the-wissett-hoards/ or contact Brian at Howard at 01986 875551

For information about the Wissett Plough contact theplough.wissett@hotmail.co.uk

HALESWORTH UNEARTHS ROYAL HISTORY

Word is beginning to spread in Halesworth that it can now boast a royal connection.

While working on the ancestry of the new royal baby, Prince George, genealogist, writer and broadcaster, Anthony Adolph, who has recently appeared on BBC’s Who Do You Think You Are?, has unearthed the fact that the Prince’s ninth great-grandfather through his mother, the Duchess of Cambridge, was a Halesworth man. Benjamin Fairfax was a draper who lived and worked in the town over 350 years ago. He was the son of a vicar of Rumburgh (another Benjamin), who was dismissed in 1662 for his nonconformist views.

Benjamin’s sister married another local minister, Bartholomew Allerton of Bramfield who had, as a child crossed to America on the Mayflower and later returned to Suffolk. His two brothers, John and Nathaniel, were also nonconformist ministers in Suffolk and they were all distant cousins of the famous Roundhead general, Thomas Fairfax, who helped overthrow King Charles I in the Civil War. The Fairfax roots ran deep in the area at the time.

It was through Benjamin’s daughter Sarah, who carried on the family tradition by marrying another nonconformist minister, Philip Meadows, that the line continued down through the generations to Catherine Middleton and now to Prince George.

Now the hunt is on to try to locate the property in which Benjamin Fairfax lived, in the hope of adding a commemorative plaque to the building if it is still standing. Halesworth and District Museum Curator, Mike Fordham, has been trawling through the town’s manorial records in the hope of making a discovery. “So far he’s proving elusive” says Mike, “even though, as a draper in a town which was thriving on the linen trade at that time, he might have been quite a significant player. But there are other archives still to pursue and there just may be someone out there who has the missing piece of the jigsaw, perhaps in an old title deed to their house, still hidden in a loft somewhere”.

Halesworth resident, Doreen Hale, who first heard the news from Mr Adolph, has been delighted by first reactions in the town. “People are stopping me and whispering ‘I hear Halesworth has royal connections. Is it true?’ Someone said to me the other day ‘It’s just the lift the town needed’”.

Chairman of the Town Council, Annette Dunning, was surprised and excited to hear of the news. “It would be nice to think that a royal visit to the ancestral home could happen sometime in the future and to give us the opportunity to show off our active rural market town”, she said.