Current Information:

Age-17

24, Seymour Buildings, Churchway, Euston Road

Dartmoor Cemetery, Becordel-Becourt, France

12th Middlesex of 54 Brigade, arrived in France in July 1915 along with the rest 18th Division and  in August moved to the Somme, a sector of the Western Front that had recently been taken over from the French. On 21st September, 1915, 12th Middlesex left their billets in Meaulte and moved into the nearby front line trenches, D2 where they stayed until relieved on 5th October. The Battalion Diary records that on 3rd October there was “nothing of any importance to report” but that a man was killed by a sniper’s bullet in the right sector. As Horace Holmes was the only man from 12th Middlesex to be killed that day we can safely conclude that it was him. We can also conclude that his family and friends would not have considered the events of that day as “nothing of importance”.