Lives of the First World War
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Essex Farm Cemetery, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium.
Essex Farm Cemetery, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium.
Essex Farm Cemetery, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium was the location of an Advanced Dressing Station (ADS) during the First World War. The concrete buildings used by the dressing stations can still be seen in the cemetery today. A project to restore the surviving bunkers at the dressing stations was carried out by the town of Ypres. The bunkers represent the largest number still visible and located together in the Ypres Salient area. The land south of Essex Farm was used as a dressing station cemetery from April 1915 to August 1917. The burials were made without definite plan and some of the divisions which occupied this sector may be traced in almost every part of the cemetery, but the 49th (West Riding) Division buried their dead of 1915 in Plot I, and the 38th (Welsh) Division used Plot III in the autumn of 1916. It was here that Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae wrote the poem In Flanders Fields in May 1915. Born in Ontario in 1872, McCrae was a physician with the Canadian Army Medical Corps during the Second Battle of Ypres. It was written at his dressing station. He died on 28 January 1918, of pneumonia and a monument in the cemetery commemorates the poem. He is buried in Wimereux Communal Cemetery. One of the youngest fatalities in the British Army in the First World War, Rifleman Valentine Joe Strudwick of the 8th Battalion Rifle Brigade who died on 14 January 1916, aged 15, is buried in Plot I, Row U Grave 8. The 49th Division Memorial is immediately behind the cemetery, on the canal bank.
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Born 1895
Died 1916
British Army 17735 Private Welsh Regiment 14th Battalion
More about Thomas James Dyer -
Died 1916
British Army 14/1274 Private York and Lancaster Regiment 2nd Battalion
More about Harold Millard -
Born 1891
Died 1916
British Army 16681 Private Royal Warwickshire Regiment 1st Battalion.
More about John Ross Taylor -
Died 1916
British Army 61625 Private Royal Army Medical Corps 9th Field Ambulance
More about Harry Eaing Dewdney -
Born 1898
Died 1916
British Army 4935 Private Machine Gun Corps
British Army 26383 Private Liverpool Regiment
British Army 4935 Private Machine Gun Corps (Infantry) 61st Company
More about Augustine Whalley -
Born 1896
Died 1916
British Army 26327 Private Machine Gun Corps
British Army 26327 Private Machine Gun Corps (Infantry) 113th Company
British Army G/21330 Private Royal Fusiliers
More about Christopher Charles Christmas -
Born 1898
Died 1916
British Army S/5861 Private Rifle Brigade 1st Battalion
More about Thomas George Robinson -
Died 1916
British Army 7553 Private Irish Guards 2nd Battalion
More about Thomas Mackey -
Died 1916
British Army 15209 Private Durham Light Infantry 11th Battalion
More about Robert Richardson -
Born 1894
Died 1917
British Army 4664 Private London Regiment
British Army Second Lieutenant London Regiment
British Army Second Lieutenant King's Royal Rifle Corps
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More about Frank Dickinson Thompson -
Died 1916
British Army 15141 Lance Corporal Coldstream Guards
British Army 15141 Private Coldstream Guards 3rd Battalion
More about Edward Bolam -
Born 1892
Died 1916
British Army 11243 Private Royal Irish Fusiliers
British Army 11243 Serjeant Royal Irish Fusiliers
More about Richard Mason -
Died 1916
British Army R/2364 Lance Corporal King's Royal Rifle Corps
British Army R/2364 Acting Corporal King's Royal Rifle Corps
British Army R/2364 Corporal King's Royal Rifle Corps 8th Battalion
More about Thomas Wilson -
Born 1893
Died 1917
British Army 4119 Private Acting Lance Corporal Hertfordshire Regiment
British Army 4119 Lance Corporal Hertfordshire Regiment
More about Herbert Currell -
Born 1897
Died 1917
British Army 220321 Pioneer Royal Engineers
More about James Bruce Kelso -
Died 1916
British Army 13498 Private Bedfordshire Regiment 8th bedford Battalion
British Army 13498 Private Bedfordshire Regiment 8th Battalion
More about Samuel Burton -
Born 1897
Died 1916
British Army S2935 Corporal Rifle Brigade
British Army S2935 Serjeant Rifle Brigade 12th Battalion
More about Thomas Walter Howell -
Born 1889
Died 1917
British Army 12178 Pioneer Royal West Kent Regiment
British Army 159353 Pioneer Royal Engineers P Special Company
More about Malcolm Mcdougall -
Born 1891
Died 1916
British Army 21815 Private Royal Welsh Fusiliers 15th Battalion
More about Frederick Langdon -
Born 1894
Died 1916
British Army R 729 Private King's Royal Rifle Corps 11th Battalion
More about Robert Neill Alfred Langridge