The 1st Wiltshire Fortress Company of the Royal Engineers was a Territorial Force unit whose officers and men were recruited almost entirely from the Great Western Railway Works at Swindon. At the outbreak of war they were taking part in their annual training at Fort Purbrook, Portsmouth and were immediately mobilised and sent to Weymouth to work on strengthening the defences around Portland. More soldiers joined the Company from among the Swindon railwaymen who enlisted at the outbreak of the war and a few were also recruited from the Weymouth area. With the aid of a large number of Infantry units, the works at Portland were completed in November and early in 1915 the Company was dispatched to France, where it was renumbered as 565th Army Troops Company, RE, and remained until the end of the War. The officers of the unit in 1914/15 were Major Frederick George Wright, Captain Cyril Spencer Wilson, Lieutenants John Dawson, Septimus Edward Tyrwhitt, David Williams and George Ernest Crisford Knapp, all engineers from the Railway Works. Henry C Rodda was the Company Sergeant Major, and was later commissioned as Lieutenant in the same Company. Wilson, Dawson and Rodda were each awarded the Military Cross for exemplary action during the war in France. In 1917, the men of 565 AT Coy RE (ex Wiltshire Fortress) received new service numbers, starting at 520001, a useful way of identifying them among the hundreds of thousands of RE men. The Company's darkest day was 18 September 1918, when a lieutenant and seven sappers were killed and 22 wounded (two of the wounded died the following day), in a German attack on the construction of a 300 foot long vehicle ramp down the face of a retaining wall of the Canal du Nord at Ruyualcourt. There is a good account of the Company's role during WW1 in Chapter 7 of Sandra Gittin's book "The Great Western Railway in the First World War".
Created by: , Bryan5462
Born 1893
Died 1918
British Army T143 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520034 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
Born 1891
Died 1978
British Army T139 Corporal Royal Engineers
British Army 520031 Corporal Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
British Army T 479 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520281 Sapper Royal Engineers
Born 1895
British Army 291 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520143 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
Born 1897
Died 1918
British Army 344 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520187 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
British Army T492 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520287 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
British Army 228 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 230067 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 175460 Sapper Royal Engineers
…
Born 1895
Died 1973
British Army 182 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520065 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army T468 Corporal Royal Engineers
British Army 520273 Corporal Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
Born 1897
Died 1976
British Army 281 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520134 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
Born 1895
Died 1973
British Army 151 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 151 Acting Serjeant Royal Engineers
British Army 528983 Private Royal Wiltshire Yeomanry
…
Born 1893
Died 1966
British Army 141 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520032 Sapper Royal Engineers
520032
…
Born 1894
Died 1951
British Army 171 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
British Army 2200096 Sergeant Royal Engineers
British Army 520057 Sergeant Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
Born 1895
British Army 145 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520036 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520036 Acting Corporal Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
British Army 520018 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
Born 1889
Died 1969
British Army 520002 Company Serjeant Major Royal Engineers
Born 1893
Died 1976
British Army 168 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520054 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
Born 1896
Died 1946
British Army T320 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520167 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
Born 1892
British Army 310 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 520159 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
Born 1893
British Army WR/177400 Sapper Royal Engineers
British Army 251 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company
British Army 520112 Sapper Royal Engineers Wiltshire (Fortress) Company