World War One soldiers: East Lancashire

With millions also listed as missing, exact figures have since been hard to determine.

But whatever the statistics, however many gravestones stand in military lines as far as the eye can see, or how many names are etched on memorials, the sorrowful truth is that each and every one of those men was somebody’s loved one.

They were all part of a family, a son, a husband, a brother or a father, many in their prime, who enlisted or were later conscripted and dutifully went off to fight for their King and country.

They had little idea what faced them as they sailed for the western or eastern front, or the extremes they would have to endure.

Some made it home, but many did not and life was never quite the same again.

Here we acknowledge those individuals who made up the huge armies which went off to face the enemy because, as many of their descendents have told us, these ordinary men who, by their very acts, became extraordinary, should never be forgotten.

• Blackburn weaver John Harrison was a fit young man in his mid twenties when he completed his basic training and although asked to stay on at the training camp as an instructor, he refused and went off to fight with his mates.

Serving with the 1st Battalion East Lancashire Regiment, he lost his life towards the end of the Battle of the Somme, on October 18, 1916, one of the 1.25 million men on all sides, who were killed as it raged.

John has no known grave, so his name is commemorated at the Memorial to the Missing of the Somme at Thiepval, France — one of nearly 73,000 British soldiers who are remembered there.

He had worked at Brookhouse Mill, attended St John’s Church, where he was the bell ringer and lived with his wife Alice in Poplar Street.

His daughter Clara never knew her father. He came home on leave after she was born in June 1916, but was never seen again.

John’s grandson, Russell Davies said: “Over the years I have searched for the battle area where he was killed and still lies and found it 18months ago just below Le Transloy Ridge, Somme.

“It was very emotional and very sad, I will never forget him as long as I live.”

Russell also has the battle orders given to the 1st Battalion as the men prepared to attack the ridge and added: “ A retired army officer was reading these orders on the day I applied for them; he went very quiet then said ’your granddad must have been a very brave man’. I went away that day very proud but sad.”

• Another victim of the Somme was 21-year-old Private Thomas Noone, who was listed missing on July 24, 1916, just five months after his arrival in France.

He served with the 20th Battalion of the Lancashire Fusiliers and his name is also on the Thiepval Memorial.

Thomas was the eldest son of Martin and Margaret Noone of Clarkhill Street, Blackburn, and he was a weaver at India Mill.

His father a Pioneer had been in France since 1915.

• William Brett, who was better known as Billy, was 18 when he joined the Loyal North Lancashire Regiment in 1916.

His battalion, the 2/4th took part in the 2nd Battle of Passchendaele in October 1917.

He was the father of Blackburn historian Barbara Riding and she said: “I never asked him about his experiences during the war.

“I did not want to remind him of the misery of being wounded, gassed, taken prisoner, depending on Red Cross parcels for food and having both legs amputated by the time he was 21.”

Her mum did tell her, however, that Billy was taken prisoner after the battle, when the Germans were looting the British bodies and found he was alive.

It was some 40 years later, in the fifties that he discovered his name was on the Roll of Honour in Blackburn Town Hall.

“He went to look and his cousin Bert Brett, who worked in the town hall, had been right.

“His name was there, but was, of course, removed. He didn't sacrifice his life for his country, but he sacrificed his legs.”

• Father of three George Pearce, born in 1885 and an iron moulder, served in the war and survived under a false name.

Married to Jane, he and his young family, lived in Park Road, Blackburn, all their lives - the Elim Pentecostal Church now stands on the site.

When war broke out, however, he went to enlist for the army with all the other young men of the time and at the recruiting office waited in line with one Elijah Cooke from Darwen.

George was rejected as he had suffered rheumatic fever as a child, but his new acquaintance was accepted.

Said his grand daugher, Mrs N Fowler of Brindle: “ Elijah had changed his mind and didn’t want to be a soldier, when they came out, so there and then they changed identities and granddad went off to war as Elijah Cooke.

“He served a full seven years in the East Kent Regiment, which was known as the Buffs and grandma always said she had a dreadful time trying to claim an allowance as there was no George Pearce in the ranks.”

He served without injury throughout WWI and on completing his enlistment period was discharged and awarded his campaign medals, all with the name Elijah Cooke on the reverse.

“Grandma always had this portrait of him in his dress uniform on the wall.

“We tend to take things granted but I’ve come to realise what my grandma suffered in both world wars - her husabnd was fighting in WWI as she brought up three young children, then in the next war, two of those children served in the forces, George in the army and Harry in the navy.”

•In 1915, the Northern Daily Telegraph reported that Mrs Miller, of 9, Mary-Ann Street, Blackburn, had four sons, all under 30, serving with the Forces.

Private William Henry, who was the oldest at 29, has been employed on the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway as a fireman.

He lived at 18 Edmondson Street and enlisted in the 16th Welsh Regiment.

The second son, Edwin, 27, who lived at 153, Brandy House Brow, had worked for the corporation at Intack tram shed.

A member of 4th East Lancashires, he had been invalided home from service in Egypt and was engaged in the recruiting service in Southport.

Harry Miller, 20, employed at Duke Street Mill, was serving with the 3rd Royal Scots Fusiliers, while the youngest brother, Fred, 19, had joined the 3rd Border Regiment.

Before enlisting he was employed at Messrs Walkers, cab proprietors.

Two of Mrs Miller’s sons-in-law were also in the army; Corporal J Matthews of 21, Edmondson Street, was attached to the Mounted Military Police, while Private Arthur Eddleston, of 54, Leyland Street, was serving with the Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry.

In a letter home in October 1915, Harry told his mum: “I am in hospital and have not had time to write before.

“It is only a week since we left the trenches where I was wounded by shrapnel in both thighs.

“We had a terrible time last week, as we took part in the attack on Hill 70.

“First of all I took part in a bayonet charge and saw sights I never wish to see again.

“I was wounded on Sunday, about dinner time and lay in a big shell hole for about seven hours until I was taken to a dressing station.

“About 12 of our company got separated from the rest and one by one they fell until only Domini Johnstone and myself were left - and then I went. “

• John Collins of Blackburn has investigated the lives and deaths of three lines of his family, including George Collins, the son of his great grandfather’s brother.

George was born in Helen St, Blackburn in 1898, the eldest child of George and Mary Collins, The first of three children born to George and Mary Collins, he was posted to the 2/4 Battalion of the East Lancs Regiment, along with 2/5 Battalion, which were both reserve Regiments .

It was quickly realised that both Regiments would be needed on the battle front and accordingly both were sent to Belgium.

George died on October 10, 1917, in the third Battle of Ypres, remembered as Passchendaele.

He endured torrents of rain as the men moved into position, bivouacing overnight in an open field, pitted with shell holes, under a waterproof sheet.

The move into position began in the early morning of October 8, with the 2/4 in the command of Major Bailey.

It was soon clear that it would be difficult to have men in position at zero hour as the barren landscape was a honeycomb of shell holes.

Crossing it in darkness, under fire would prove a superhuman task In the fighting that followed the battalion lost 316 men, killed or wounded, Private Collins, 203338 among them. He is buried in Tyne Cot cemetery.

•  James Baldwin was one of six children born to Joseph and Jane Baldwin at Church St, Higher Walton in 1896.

He was the elder brother of John’s grandmother Ann Baldwin .

By 1911 the family had moved to 6 Railway View , Mill Hill and James began work as a weaver.

He enlisted in the East Lancs Regiment , serving firstly in the 3rd Battalion and then in the 6th Service Battalion, East Lancs Regiment , part of the 38th Brigade, which formed part of the 13th Western Division.

The 6th (Service) Battalion entered the ancient town of Ctesiphon in a blinding sandstorm after a punishing 115 mile march in 12 12 days, in March 1917.

Over the following days the men faced a stiff test, forcing a crossing of the Diyalah river and men were shot down in waves as they tried to ferry pontoons across the river.

A hundred men finally secured a bridge head and after a three day siege the east Lancashires finally made their way across and the following day entered Baghdad.

James who had been wounded in the fighting, died on March 10, 1917 and is buried in the Amara cemetery by the banks of the river Tigris.

• John Cosgrove was born in Blackburn in 1896 and was the second eldest of nine children, three of whom died in infancy.

He was the brother of John Collins’ other grandma, Mary Cosgrove.

He was baptised at St Alban’s R.C. Church Blackburn and later attended St Alban’s school .

There are indications that he was a spirited lad, for as a teenager he went to work on a Fleetwood trawler as a fisherman, an unlikely calling for most Blackburn youths .

When the First World War began, he enlisted and was posted to The Kings Own Royal Lancaster Regiment, with barracks in Lancaster.

Said John: “Family stories tell us that a large portrait of him hung over the mantelpiece of his father’s home, which showed him in the uniform of The Black Watch, because he thought the uniform looked more dashing and hired one for the photographer.”

That portrait is now sadly lost.

John added: “It is not clear where his military training took place, but on several occasions he absconded and returned home.

“His father John, himself a tough character, answered the door to pursuing police and after some direct talking, threatened that if they should step over the doorstep into the house he would ‘knock your bloody heads off ‘.”

John was assigned to A Company, 2nd Battalion of the Royal Lancaster Regiment which was involved in the second Ypres Campaign, Belgium.

At the battle of Frezenberg Ridge on May 8, 1915, almost the entire Battalion was wiped out, including John Cosgrove, who has only 19 years old.

Eleven hundred strong when the day began, it could only muster 67 at the end of it.

Even after all those had rejoined who had become detached in the fighting, the casualties were eventually found to be 15 officers and 893 other ranks, the worst day in the regiment’s history.

John has no known grave, hardly surprising given the devastation of this battle, but is remembered on the Menin Gate, Ypres Memorial.