Current Information:

Farringdon

Born-St Luke's

Delville Wood Cemetery, Longueval, France

The Battle of the Somme (July-November, 1916)

By the beginning of August the Battle of the Somme had been raging for a full month. Thousands of men had already been killed or wounded or were simply missing, never to be seen again and and just a few square miles of the French countryside, all in the southern part of the battlefield, had been captured from the enemy. Mistakes had been made by the various commanders and would be continued to be made but there was no turning back as the British, Australians, South Africans, New Zealanders and Canadians carried on battering away at the German defences in the hope of a breakthrough, So it continued all the way through to November with nearly every battalion and division then in France being drawn into it at some stage. In the end the German trenches had been pushed back a few more miles along most of the line but the cost in lives had been staggering. By the end of the fighting in November, 1916, British Army casualties numbered over 400,000, killed, wounded and missing.

On 9th August, 1916, 1st Royal Fusiliers of 17 Brigade, 24th Division moved into the front line from Delville Wood to Trones Wood with their HQ in Waterlot Farm. On 10th August they sustained 23 casualties when a number of British 9.2 inch shells fell short and landed on ‘B’ Company. The explosions buried many of the men but their comrades managed to dig most of them out. Not all survived however and one of those who was killed was Henry Christopher.