Your Towns and Cities in the Great War

Leatherhead

in the Great War

Your Towns and Cities in the Great War

Leatherhead

in the Great War

Lorraine Spindler

First published in Great Britain in 2016 by

PEN & SWORD MILITARY

an imprint of

Pen and Sword Books Ltd

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Copyright © Lorraine Spindler, 2016

ISBN 978 1 47384 392 9

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Acknowledgements

It has been a privilege to research those who lived in Leatherhead during the Great War. The residents of Leatherhead suffered beyond imagination and yet so many of their stories have been lost over time. This book began from my work with the Leatherhead and District Museum to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the war and its impact on the local community. Thanks therefore go to the Leatherhead Museum’s Monday team: Alan Pooley, Alun Roberts, Doug Hollingsworth and Gwen Hoad; their advice and guidance has proved invaluable. Thanks to everyone at the Monday Genealogy Group for your invaluable support.

Special thanks goes to the Leatherhead History Society, especially the archivists Roy Mellick and John Rowley, for the access and help regarding archive material. Permission to use the archive images is gratefully acknowledged. A special thanks to Simon Jervis for his help deciphering military photographs and to Julian Womersley for sharing his local knowledge. Thanks to Lenka Cathersides for sharing her research and interest in genealogy.

Much of the material relating Leatherhead’s war dead is based on the invaluable research of Liam Sumption and the Leatherhead Memorial website hosted by the Friends of Leatherhead Parish Church with Leatherhead & District Local History Society. The Taylor family were particularly helpful in supplying information regarding the Taylor brothers who died and their bereaved mother Louisa.

Personal thanks go to Kathy Atherton and Erica Chambers of Dorking Museum for their shared passion to know more about the soldiers who fought during the war. Thank you to my patient friends dragged to various archives and museums: Julie Wennell and Pauline Walker and to family: Peter, Joanna and Imogen Spindler, Peter and Susie Holland, Milly, Brenda Allcock, Margaret, Daphne and Karl Hoad for all their constant support and encouragement.

Copyright Notice

All efforts have been made to establish copyright of images used in this book and to trace any copyright holders; however, in some cases this has not been possible. Please get in touch via the publisher if you are the owner of a copyright image so that due credit may be given in later editions.

CHAPTER 1

Is It Worth Fighting For? Leatherhead before the War

‘a neat, clean little town, isolated in the wide countryside’

Leatherhead was a relatively small Edwardian country town, situated four miles south-west of Epsom, five miles north of Dorking and slightly north-east of the midpoint of Surrey. The town was a particular focal point for the surrounding rural villages of Ashtead, Great Bookham, Little Bookham, Headley, Mickleham, Stoke D’Abernon and Fetcham. Covering an area of 3,481 acres, Leatherhead was aptly described by A.J. Ginger, a resident from the 1880s, as a ‘neat, clean little town, isolated in the wide countryside’. The River Mole ran through the town and was crossed, then as now, by a fourteen arched bridge. The original medieval bridge was rebuilt by George Gwilt in 1784. Travellers on the ancient north-south or east-west routes would stop at the Swan Hotel, a seventeenth century coaching inn, to enjoy its accommodation, refreshments or exchange their horses.

Parliamentary Recruiting Committee Poster.

The ford across the River Mole pictured at the end of the nineteenth century.

Leatherhead’s fourteen arch bridge over the River Mole.

Farm labourers on Overton Farm.

The population of Leatherhead grew from 4,694 in 1901 to 5,491 by the time of the next census in 1911. By 1914 around 20 per cent of the population were employed as domestic servants, a small proportion of men travelled to the City but the majority worked locally in the brewing, brick making, sawmill industries or agriculture.

The town in the early nineteenth century had become a close-knit community which worked and socialised together. Virtually self-sufficient, people relied on each other to survive. It was not uncommon for a single individual to attend church on a Sunday, work in a shop, volunteer as a fireman, play for the town’s football team and perform in the town’s silver band.

Farming was the focus for many families and horse ploughing continued up until the Second World War. Kelly’s Directory shows farriers, harness-makers and wheelwrights thriving in Bridge Street, High Street, Randalls Road and Kingston Road.

An Edwardian advertisement for Ye Olde Leather House, Bridge Street, an antique shop and servant’s registry office. These were similar to recruitment agencies; fees could be taken from both servants and their employers. Some registries provided girls with lodgings until they found a position. During the war employers found it increasingly impossible to hire servants as the men joined the armed services or the women discovered increased opportunities in the labour market.

To house the growing population during the early years of the new century, Leatherhead’s building projects flourished in the form of developments in the Fairfield, Highlands Road, Kingston Road and Queen Anne’s Garden area. These were shortly followed by developments in Copthorne Road, Clinton Road, Kingston Avenue, Reigate Road, St Nicholas Hill and Woodville Road, all boasting the installation of electricity. The Swan Hotel stood at the heart of the cross of the narrow lanes of North Street, Bridge Street, Church Street and High Street and the parish church of St Mary and St Nicholas dominated the hill overlooking the town.

View from the bottom of the High Street at the end of the nineteenth century, Church Street is on the left of the picture, the top of Bridge Street is on the right.

Top of Leatherhead High Street at the end of the nineteenth century.

Bridge Street looking up towards the Swan Hotel at the end of the nineteenth century.

Music and drama were important aspects of town life. On Saturday nights the shops would stay open into the evening and the Leatherhead Silver Band would stand outside the Duke’s Head or Town Clock and play to the crowds. The Victoria Hall, in the High Street, provided a venue for visiting theatre companies or the local Leatherhead Amateur Dramatic and Operatic Society. Travelling circuses would pitch themselves on the Common, but arguably the most exciting arrival for the inhabitants were the travelling bears and itinerant showmen who performed at the Town Clock.

Leatherhead, according to A.J. Ginger’s childhood recollections, was ‘prone to dress itself up at the slightest provocation’ including Queen Victoria’s Jubilee, early successes during the Boer War and the Coronation of Edward VII. These events were reason enough to festoon the town with red, white and blue flags, bunting and fairy lights. Town processions, music and sports at Randalls Park added to the celebrations. Bonfires were lit to mark extra special occasions; the 1902 Coronation bonfire drew a crowd of around a thousand people in Kingston Road. The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser reported the weather at the Coronation celebrations had been poor, the bonfire committee decided to delay the fireworks, but this decision was not kindly received by the crowd and ‘unpleasantness’ was threatened. The crowd had to make do with watching the impressive fire alone, which was eleven yards across and twenty feet high, composed of railway sleepers and ten waggon loads of faggots, which burnt for over two hours.

Leatherhead Town Clock the focal point for travelling showmen. In 1916 the Town Clock was chosen as the location for a War Shrine to the fallen and serving soldiers of Leatherhead.

Bridge Street in 1902 decorated for the Coronation of Edward VII.

Bridge Street decorated for Queen Victoria’s Jubilee in 1897.

The Swan Hotel was often the focus of New Year’s Eve celebrations and both the hotel and brewery operated throughout the war. Before the war the American millionaire Alfred Vanderbilt was a regular visitor to the Swan with his personal stage coach ‘the Venture’ on his journeys between London to Brighton.

Leatherhead’s Edward VII Coronation Celebrations August 1902.

The Swan Hotel before the war.

Life in Leatherhead for many of the poorer residents, tradesmen and farmers was not always easy. Around 1908 the Leatherhead and District Commercial Association was formed to improve trading in the town, but the winters of 1908, 1909 and 1910 were especially harsh. Consequently, the parish church stepped in to offer relief to the poor through its soup kitchens, the distribution of 120 pints of milk and 60 loaves of bread a day, for three days of the week.

In the decade before the war the Liberal government attempted to tackle poverty through various reforms. The Education Act 1906 increased the provision of school meals but by 1914 less than half of local authorities still did not offer meals. In 1908 old age pensions were introduced and the Insurance Act of 1911 attempted to protect citizens against hardship through illness or unemployment. In turn the Shop Act of 1911 set the maximum working week to sixty hours.

Bernard Stenning was a well-respected solicitor, founder of the Leatherhead and District Commercial Association and Leader of the Church Lads’ Brigade.

The biggest threat to Leatherhead businesses was the war. Thriving companies such as the ironmongers Blaker Bros. struggled to retain their staff. Harry Thomas Searle worked for Blaker Bros. as a motor driver. During the war Searle became a private in the Army Service Corps’ motor transport section. Private Searle died on 8 January 1916 on his way to Salonika aboard the SS Citta Di Palermo, an Italian transport carrying Dominion troops, when it was sunk by a mine off Brindisi, Italy. After he had been reported missing Mrs Searle received a postcard from her husband, oddly dated after the 8 January 1916, but he was never heard from again.

An advertisement for Blaker Bros. 1912. The company was established in 1858.

Another Blaker Bros. employee, 39-year-old Richard A. Bullman, was served notice that he was going to be conscripted in July 1916. Alfred Blaker appealed to the Military Tribunal for exemption for Bullman, on the grounds he was the only employee with the skills to fix agricultural implements. Bullman’s exemption was granted but only until after the harvest that year.

Arthur Skelton was the proprietor of Skelton’s tobacconist and hairdressers and was a regular advertiser in the local papers. The Skelton family lived at the shop premises, next to the Victoria Hall in the High Street. Arthur and his wife, Ann, had eight children. The 1911 Census shows Arthur’s three sons, Walter, Charles, Albert and his daughter Rose living at home; two sons were hairdressers working in the tobacconists, Albert was a compositor and Rose was a ‘fancy goods dealer’ – which could be anything from gloves to inkstands. Arthur appeared on the 1911 Census but by the time his youngest son, Albert Skelton, married in September 1914 Arthur had died. The sons who worked in the business were all in their thirties in 1916 and eligible for conscription. Businesses such as Skelton’s may well have struggled to maintain their staff, but the war also created an influx of business from the various soldiers billeted or visiting the town. Albert’s marriage to Ethel Akehurst took place on 5 September 1914 and despite the outbreak of war they travelled by motor car to Torquay for their honeymoon.

In 1890 the Victoria Hall had opened in the High Street and presented popular melodramas. The Leatherhead Dramatic and Operatic Society put on various entertainments for the local population.

Blaker Bros. at the corner of North Street and High Street.

Alfred Blaker (on the right holding the brake) of Blaker Bros. the Ironmonger and his wife Rose Blanche Blaker, 3 September 1912, on holiday in Ilfracombe. At the time this photograph was taken the Blaker family were living at Park Rise, Leatherhead.

The Leatherhead Pierrots performing at the Victoria Hall, High Street, 1904.

The Leatherhead Pierrots 1906. Back Row – G. Furniss, Amy Pearman, W.J. Higgs, Miss N. Prest, S.R. Drake. Front Row – Miss G. Finch, Mr L. Wade, Mr .F Folly, Miss E. Wade.

The local paper headline, DRAMATIC PERFORMANCES AT LEATHERHEAD, declared the Leatherhead Dramatic and Operatic Society’s shows to be the most eagerly awaited event of the year. In 1910 they performed Basil Hood and Edward German’s comic opera ‘Merrie England’, the first of five performances in aid of funds for the Cottage Hospital. The article did however imply that a Gilbert and Sullivan Operetta would have been more popular with the audience.

Later in 1910 the Victoria Hall was converted into a picture house called the Grand Cinema for silent films and later, ‘talkies’. In March 1914 the residents were urged to go and see a new film called ‘The British Army’, ‘it may be small, but it goes a long way on the cinema’, read an article in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser. The film offered the unique, behind the scenes, perspective of the Army, which ‘even officers who have served for years… readily acknowledged the film had shown them things they have never before seen.’ As there was a stronger military presence in everyday life at this time the film proved to be especially popular.

The Grand Cinema was to show the documentary film ‘The Battle of the Somme’ in 1916. Shot by two official cinematographers, Geoffrey Malins and John McDowell, it depicted the early days of the Battle of the Somme (1 July – 18 November 1916). The film had its première in London on 10 August 1916 and was released to towns like Leatherhead on 21 August. It was a great success, watched by around 20 million people in its first six weeks.

Advertisement for the Grand Cinema’s showing of the film ‘The British Army’ in March 1914.

A programme of events at the Grand Cinema, Victoria Hall.

The Letherhead (a Victorian version of the town’s name) Literary and Scientific Institute was founded in 1892 by Abraham Dixon of Cherkley Court. The Institute helped foster the feeling of belonging to a small community in which the gentleman, tradesman and shopkeeper could gather together to enjoy their free time. There was a large reading room, recreation and committee rooms on the ground floor, and a hall for public meetings. The suite of rooms on the second floor was used by the Men’s Institute.

The Leatherhead Silver Band was a major entertainment feature before and after war. The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser usually reported on their weekly activities, such as the Promenade Concert in the grounds of Wrydelands by kind permission of Mr S. Le Blanc Smith. These concerts were usually very well attended. The following week it would be the turn of Mr A.T. Miller at Emlyn House to host a concert. The band, although limited in numbers, played throughout the war supporting the parades of the Church Lads’ Brigade, VADs or helping to raise funds for various wartime related causes.

The Letherhead Literary and Scientific Institute in 1895. During the war it would become a centre of recreational activity for soldiers billeted in the town.

Wealthier residents of Leatherhead were able to indulge in house parties, balls, point-to-point racing, polo, fox hunting and shooting. They were also keen to patronise the town’s businesses, employ local residents and contribute to the social and political aspects of the community. It was Mr Abraham Dixon and Mr Cunliffe who had supplied the raw materials for the Coronation bonfire.

Leatherhead Silver Band in the 1920s, smaller in size than the numbers it had enjoyed before the war.

Mr Ockenden’s Picnic 13 June 1908 – The family lived at Devonshire House and Hampton Cottage, Church Street (now Leatherhead Museum). Egbert lived at Kenora, Kingston Road.

Leatherhead was proud of the amenities the town had to offer. It was governed by an Urban District Council, under the Act of 1894, and was supplied with gas by a company started in 1850 and incorporated by Act of Parliament in 1901, and with water by a company formed in 1883, the wells of which are in Fetcham. At the outbreak of war the focus of numerous council meetings was how best to protect the town’s water from enemy sabotage.

The firemen were part-time and worked locally in other jobs. The Clock Tower had been built in the 1850s to house the dust cart or the fire engine, both pulled by the horses when in use, and the horses were stabled in Bridge Street. Queen Victoria’s Jubilee in 1887 inspired the brigade to take delivery of a new engine.

Sir Robert Peel’s ‘bobbies’ were not seen on the streets of Leatherhead until 1851, for financial reasons, even though they had been recommended by the County Police Act of 1839. The police station was situated at Fairfield and was run by an inspector and a few constables. This was a time when minor misdemeanours were reported in the newspapers. For example on 6 November 1905 Leatherhead’s PC Pickard had been called out twice to Alfred Hamper before the driver had awoken, whilst parked in The Crescent. Alfred was ordered to pay a fine of 5 shillings for being asleep in charge of a horse and cart. Riding on the footpath in Epsom Road, Leatherhead was also a serious matter for the magistrates and worthy of report in the 7 June 1902 Surrey Mirror. The offender, George Penny, claimed the road was too muddy to bicycle on. The authorities responded with a 2s 6d fine and a warning to walk with his bicycle on the pavements if the same problem arose again.

The Leatherhead Fire Brigade with their engine. The Clock Tower behind had been especially built to house the fire engine. Percy Skelton, one of Leatherhead’s firemen, joined the Coldstream Guards and died on 25 January 1915.

The Merryweather Steam Fire Pump before the war. The two men in uniform were James Izzard, a pipefitter at the Leatherhead District Water Company, and Joseph James Cowan the outdoor waterworks superintendent. The Water Company would house the pump at weekends.

On 8 February 1913 at the Duke’s Head, forty postmasters gathered for their annual dinner. The chairman, in his speech, noted that despite their new duties under the Insurance Act and the recent transfer of the responsibility of the telephone system to the post office ‘the past year had not been one where there had been anything very startling happening.’ Leatherhead residents had posted 1,419,000 letters, 1,820,000 letters were delivered alongside 51,000 telegrams, and the handling of over 300,000 telephone calls in the past twelve months.

Once war had broken out, with so many men away on active service and others billeted in Leatherhead, the volume of post, telegrams and phone calls increased. Letters and cards were sent every week by soldiers from the Front. The problem was further compounded as postmen signed up for military service, taking their skills with them.

Embroidered cards were especially popular with soldiers and treasured by those who received them. The reverse of this one reads, ‘Dear Little Arthur, I hope you will like this card as it’s the best I could find, mind you take care of it and be a good boy. From your loving Daddy xxxxxxxxxx’

Leatherhead Post Office Staff before the war.

At one time Leatherhead had four railway stations, two of which were temporary and survived for only eight years from the railway’s first opening in 1859. The remaining lines were not electrified by the Southern Railway until five years after the end of the war. The South Western Railway had been continued to Guildford in 1887. The London and South Western Railway line from Wimbledon and Worcester Park had a terminus in Leatherhead, opened in 1859; it had been intended to take this line on to Dorking, but it was never concluded. In 1867 the through route by Epsom, Dorking, and Horsham to Portsmouth was completed by the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway Company using part of the South Western line, but with a separate station at Leatherhead.

The Queen Victoria Memorial Hospital had been opened to patients in 1905 and served residents for over forty years. The land on which it was built in Epsom Road was donated by Walter Cunliffe of Tyrells Wood. During the war Cunliffe was the Governor of the Bank of England.

There were a large number of gentlemen’s houses and manors in Leatherhead. Gravel Hill was home to one of the longest serving members of the Royal Navy, Admiral Augustus Sinclair Booth (1810–1906). Birmingham wool manufacturer Abraham Dixon (1820-1900) lived at Cherkley Court, built in 1866-70; his wife stayed on until her death in 1909 enabling the property to be sold to Canadian press baron Max Aitken, Lord Beaverbrook (1879–1964). Mr Arthur Tritton JP resided at The Priory; Tritton became the Chairman of the Leatherhead Urban District Council, an Epsom magistrate and in 1912 was appointed to the recruiting committee of the Territorials.

Leatherhead Railway Station around 1900.

North Street looking towards Gravel Hill (to the right of the Clock Tower) as Admiral Booth knew it in 1895.

Arthur Henry Tritton, a stockbroker, Chairman of the Leatherhead Urban District Council, churchwarden and sportsman who had married the widowed Louisa Woolf (nee Davis). At the time of their marriage in 1878, Woolf already had four young daughters named Sybil, Beatrice, Bloom David and Mary Snowdrop. Louisa’s first husband was London solicitor, David Woolf, an uncle of Virginia Woolf’s husband, Leonard. The Jewish Woolf family was alleged to have been outraged that Louisa should marry Arthur Tritton, a Gentile. Arthur and Louise moved into the Priory, Leatherhead and had three children of their own, Winifred, Arthur and Nigel. (Surrey Libraries)

The Priory, Leatherhead home to Arthur Henry Tritton.

Cherkley Court home of Abraham Dixon and Max Aitken.

Other homes of those at the higher end of the social spectrum included Pachesham Park, the home of Mr F.C. Ramsey; Wrydelands, home to the Le Blanc Smith family; Givons, formerly Gibbon’s Grove, was where Mr H.P. Sturgis lived.

The Royal School for the Blind, Highlands Road, was founded in St George’s Fields, 1799, incorporated by royal charter in 1826, and removed to Leatherhead in 1902 where it offered places for 250 residents. The foundation stone of the new buildings was laid by HRH the Princess Christian and the completed building was considered the most advanced of its kind in Europe. The building was used during the war for drill practice by the Volunteer Training Corps which sadly meant the residents were not able to have as many visitors as they would normally enjoy.

The Royal School for the Blind in Highlands Road.

Such was the affluence enjoyed by Leatherhead at the end of the nineteenth century, that architect Sir Arthur Blomfield was employed by the town in 1873 to restore the interior of St Mary and St Nicholas, replacing the old box pews with oak seating. In the late 1880s he would return to Leatherhead to design All Saints Church, on the Kingston Road; the foundation stone was laid by the Duchess of Albany in 1888.

The nave of the Parish Church of St Mary and St Nicholas before the restorations of 1873.

The £1,900 cost of the All Saints’ project was raised by local subscriptions which were proudly listed in the parish magazines. Apprenticed to his uncle in 1881-84, Reginald Blomfield would go on to design the Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing in Ypres and a large number of First World War memorials.

Leatherhead offered a variety of Christian places of worship. Alongside the parish church of St Mary and St Nicholas, mentioned in the Domesday Book, there was a Wesleyan chapel and hall, a Baptist chapel, and a Congregational chapel, which was built in 1844 but represents a longer standing congregation. From the outset of war the town folk of Leatherhead would turn to their respective churches for leadership and comfort during the difficult times ahead.

On 24 February 1913 Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst was taken to Leatherhead Police Station accused of encouraging others to place explosives in Walton Heath Golf Club Pavilion. She had already been found guilty of involvement of the bomb explosion at 6.10am on the 19 February at Lord Riddell’s House, to be used by Lloyd George, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, at Walton-on-the-Hill, five miles from Leatherhead. Rather than locking Mrs Pankhurst in a police cell, Superintendent Coleman reported, ’She is being detained in Inspector Tudgay’s sitting room and I have arranged with the Inspector to sleep her in one of his bedrooms tonight.’

Sir Arthur Blomfield and his apprentice nephew, Sir Reginald Blomfield, the designer of the Menin Gate Memorial, Ypres, Belgium.

North Street looking towards the Clock Tower in 1896. The Congregational Church is on the left hand side.

Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst leaving Epsom Magistrates Court. (Surrey Libraries)

This was not the first time Leatherhead’s women’s suffrage supporters had been in the local headlines. In 1909 the Women’s Freedom League (Suffragettes) called a meeting outside the Old Bull Inn to hear the views of Mrs Greig and Mrs Despard who were travelling around the country in a horse drawn van emblazoned with the motto ‘Votes for Women’. With a crowd of up to 500 gathering, including those hostile towards women’s suffrage, the meeting was adjourned to the Victoria Hall in the High Street. Unfortunately this meeting was attacked as the mob desperately tried to break up the meeting, even climbing onto the roof of the hall.

The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser told of another well-supported meeting at Victoria Hall. Organised by the Leith Hill branch of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies, the motion was carried that ‘social reform would be hastened … by extending the vote to women’. Retired Colonel H.H. Gordon Clark of nearby Mickleham Hall brought a round of applause and laughter when he announced to the audience regarding their cause: ‘He was not a convert and therefore could not come to the platform’, but he continued, after hearing the speeches, he was going on to the platform and was ‘going to take my place, not beside my wife, but behind her.’

Leatherhead’s first national school was founded by the Reverend Benjamin Chapman in July 1838. Supported by the parishioners and the National Society for the Education of the Poor, the Leatherhead Highlands Road School took on eighty boys in one classroom; a year later an additional classroom began the education of girls. By the 1860s the town also had two infant schools for children between three and seven at Gravel Hill and Leatherhead Common, the latter held in a disused railway engine house.

A school log book entry dated 18 October 1879:

‘The attendance worse, the children are so sad, their coughs and colds so bad that it is quite painful to hear them.’

The Education (Provision of Meals) Act 1906 was passed because of the general poor health and lack of nutrition of the nation’s children. This was as a direct result of studies which indicated in 1889 over 50,000 pupils in London alone were attending school ‘in want of food’. The 1904 Report into Physical Deterioration was instigated by the large rejection of men from service in the Boer War because of malnourishment. The introduction of school milk and food was a direct result, should Britain need to go to war, of the need to provide strong young men to fight and equally healthy young women to produce the next generation.

Leatherhead Common Infants School. Taken in the early 1890s and known to include the 4-year-old Arthur John Wilsden (born Dec. 1888), these boys, in their late twenties during 1914-18 belonged to the generation most likely to have volunteered or been conscripted into military service.

Initially founded with the aim of providing free public school education for the sons of the clergy, St John’s moved from Clapton to Leatherhead in 1872, a new building on a 12-acre site near to the town centre. Compared to its previous London facilities, Leatherhead had limitations, but the surrounding countryside was favourable as it provided exploration opportunities for the pupils. Sneaking off to the Derby at Epsom Racecourse was strictly prohibited, but the boys were supplied with beer, bought at 24s a barrel from the Swan Brewery. In 1912 St John’s followed in the footsteps of its fellow public schools by starting its own junior division of the Officer Training Corps (OTC), based on the Haldane Reforms (1906–1912). The OTC junior divisions aimed to implement ‘a standardized degree of elementary military training with a view to providing candidates for commissions’. Former St John’s OTC pupils would find themselves as prime officer candidates by the end 1918.

St John’s School and grounds in the 1930s.

Disaster struck in 1913 when the main school building was gutted by fire, creating the need for temporary evacuation. July 1914 was a short-lived time of hope for the school when the new buildings were reopened by HRH The Duchess of Albany. Within weeks of the reopening war had been declared. The headmaster was immediately faced with staff shortages, as assistant masters joined up, and a less academic timetable because of the OTC increased training demands. Former pupil, E.M.P. Williams in his centenary history of St John’s, The Quest Goes On, wrote:

‘As the years wore slowly on to 1918, the increasing efficiency of the Corps only seemed to accelerate the pace for providing first-class material for the War Office sausage-machine, which in turn produced Schoolboy Subalterns for the Slaughterhouse of the Western Front.’

The town’s first football club was formed in 1886 and twenty-one years later the Leatherhead Rose team was established by men from Leatherhead Common area who used the Kingston Road Recreation Ground. The Rose team played friendlies until the formation of the Dorking and District League in 1909, which they joined and won the First League Championship. The league was forced to shut down during the war as the young men went off to war. The Taylor brothers were particularly associated with the Rose team, seven brothers went off to war, five died and a sixth lost his leg. Nicknamed ‘lucky’ one of the Taylor brothers, Arthur, re-joined the team after the war and helped take it back to its top spot in the league. There is more about the Taylor family in Chapter 8.

The Old Bull 1905. The three elms, on the right of the picture, caught fire during the Armistice Night Bonfire in 1918.

The Leatherhead football team pictured at the end of the 1912/13 season outside the Old Rising Sun Pub with the Dorking and District League trophy. Back row – Alf Shurville, Fred Palmer, Alfred Taylor, Benjamin Tutt, Arthur Searle (proprietor of the Rising Sun), Stan Loxley, Tim Tutt, Hutton and Arthur Taylor. Front Row – W. Prutton, Footman, Fred Hatchwell, Harry Baker (with Billy, the club mascot) and Fred Taylor. Alfred and Fred were two of the five Taylor brothers to die in the war.

Cricket was an especially popular pastime in Leatherhead; the Rover’s Cricket Club had been in existence for over sixty-five years when war broke out. There were a number of teams in the town including the St John’s Schoolboys, Post Office, Town Band, Young Men’s Institute and Fire Brigade. The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser reported the well-attended annual smoking concert held at the Running Horse on Monday, 16 December 1913 demonstrating it was not just playing cricket that provided the opportunity for the men to socialise. The chairman reported a good season and of sixteen matches played, six were won, three drawn and seven lost. Mr J. Richardson was at the head of the batting figures with an average of thirty-three. Mr W. Collins, E. Leavey, E. Tinsley and H.W. Jeeves had also done good work. A ‘capital’ musical programme was provided.

There was no noticeable sense of an impending foreign crisis in the national or local papers before the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand on 28 June 1914, instead the papers had been fixed on the continuing Irish Home Rule problems. On 31 July Prime Minister Herbert Asquith informed the Archbishop of Canterbury that Britain would not intervene in any European war. The crisis was to unfold over the August bank holiday weekend with national spirit and anxiety rapidly growing. When Germany invaded Luxembourg on 2 August and demanded passage through Belgium, the news of the German ultimatum reached London on the morning of the bank holiday Monday, 3 August. Britain’s ultimatum to Germany expired at 11pm on 4 August 1914. The residents of Leatherhead ended their bank holiday with the news that Britain, as part of the Entente powers, was at war with the Central Powers of Germany, Austria-Hungary and their allies.

CHAPTER 2

Are You in This? – Volunteers

Lord Curzon addressed the masters and boys of Harrow School in a speech on 16 October 1914. His advice was reported across Britain in an article entitled, THOUGHTS AND DEEDS TO AVOID IN WAR TIME. The article ran alongside the news describing the death of Captain Henry Gratten Elliot of the Devonshire Regiment on 19 September 1914. Henry was the youngest son of the Elliots, from The Marches, Epsom Road, Leatherhead; such juxtaposition with Curzon’s speech must have made his warning all the more poignant.

Lord Curzon began his speech, ‘Don’t think the war does not affect you individually; it touches every one of us – it touches every man, woman, and child in this country.’

Curzon was to join the Cabinet, as Lord Privy Seal, when Asquith formed a coalition government in May 1915. If any resident in Leatherhead believed the war would not alter their lives they were mistaken.

From 8 August 1914 the population of Britain found itself under martial law rather than living in the democracy it had cherished. Parliament passed the Defence of the Realm Act (DORA) effectively suspending civil rights until the end of the war. Any person breaking the security regulations could be court martialled, the police could stop, search and question any suspect and non-compliance could lead to imprisonment. Arrest could be made without a warrant. Land and property could be requisitioned for military purposes, although the wealthier residents would often voluntarily offer the use of their property to serve the war effort.

Parliamentary Recruitment Committee Poster, 1915 by S.S. Baden-Powell.

George Nathaniel Curzon, Marquis Curzon of Kedleston (1859–1925), the British Conservative statesman who was the Viceroy of India and the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.

Lord Curzon’s ‘Thoughts and Deeds to avoid in war’. (Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser, 16 October 1915)

The Press Bureau was established to make sure the newspapers did not reveal confidential information, especially troop movements. The bureau would also distribute the official war news. On the forbidden list were the flying of kites, starting bonfires, buying binoculars, feeding wild animals bread, discussing naval and military matters or buying alcohol on public transport. Alcoholic beverages were watered down and pub opening times were restricted to 12 noon till 3pm and 6.30pm till 9.30pm.

The King’s Proclamation, 4 August 1914.

The 1871 novella The Battle of Dorking by George Tomkyns Chesney, the first in a wave of Victorian invasion literature. It described an invasion of Britain by the German-speaking army of an unnamed country. The story tells of a veteran who participated in the Battle of Dorking and is recounting the final days before and during the invasion of Britain. Leatherhead is six miles from Dorking and because the book went through seven editions, selling over 80,000 copies, the local population of both towns would have been aware of its story and the perceived consequences of such an invasion. The War of the Worlds (1898), the science fiction novel by H.G. Wells, whose invading aliens landed near Woking continued the trend of invasion literature.

One of the main public concerns was what would happen in the event of a German invasion on mainland Britain. In December 1914 an article entitled STAY BY THEIR HOMES was published. In the event of an invasion the Home Office via the Lord Lieutenant advised the civil population of Leatherhead that they should stay by their homes, farms, or villages, and as far as possible should carry on their usual vocation. The article warned that nothing could be more harmful or dangerous than a sudden ‘flight of the public under the influence of panic on the part of women, children or old people’. Any movement ordered by the military would be properly controlled, ordered and directed by the police, and nothing else could be attempted. Above all the movement of troops and artillery should not be hampered by civilians on the roads.

With God on our side – Guidance of the Church

From the early stages of the conflict the residents of Leatherhead looked to the Church for guidance and information. The Reverend Thomas Frederick Hobson wrote a letter on 27 August 1914 for the September Leatherhead Parish Magazine which spoke of a time of ‘terrible crisis of our national history’. He asked the readers to ponder the Bishop of Guildford, John Randolf’s letter to the churches of the diocese which stated the magnitude of unfolding events and urged everyone to come together in prayer.

The Reverend Thomas Frederick Hobson of St Mary and St Nicholas Parish Church. He organised a call to prayer at noon every day to pray for the King, those in authority, soldiers, sailors, allies, those suffering, the anxious and the sorrowful.

Hobson recognised ‘the real pressure of trouble, which is inevitable, is still to come for us, and we know not how heavy and how prolonged it may be. We must, therefore, be resolute to endure, unselfish in standing by and supporting one another.’ Weekly services of intercession were to be held in Leatherhead’s churches and parishioners across the country where encouraged to pray at noon every day. Hobson made it clear the conflict was not one they had sought but given the appalling suffering of Belgium, peace had become ‘impossible for us on any terms’. God was to bring about victory but the congregation were to make sure ‘no failure of ours cause Him to turn away His face from us’.

Leatherhead’s Charity War Work

Across Britain nearly 18,000 charities were established during the war creating a new wave of voluntary activities for servicemen and their families. Behind this urge to get involved were often the wealthier sections of society who were keen to put their time and money behind the growing war effort both at home and overseas. The sheer scale of help required was unprecedented. Such volunteers helped create a social cohesion to bolster the morale of the British troops and the general population.

Popular causes in Leatherhead included the supply of comforts such as clothing, books and food, tobacco, medical services, support for disabled servicemen, organisations for the relief of distress at home, post-war remembrance and celebration, aid for refugees and assistance for prisoners of war. Newspapers ran appeals for everything from sports equipment to tinned food. Men on active service received an extraordinary range of gifts from the fund, including footballs and cricket equipment, gramophones and records, books, banjos, violins and games. Often the advertisements reflect a hint of humour and irony like this from the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of November 1914:

‘Field Glasses Wanted. The Rev M.A. Daniell, of the Rectory Caterham, will be glad to receive second hand field glasses of a good range for presentation to commissioned officers who have returned from the Front and will be going out again. There is a great need for these glasses to discover the whereabouts of the enemy.’

The local newspapers repeatedly appealed for books for the troops. All books and magazines were donated at Leatherhead Post Office and forwarded to the army camp’s library for distribution. Such donations promised the donor ‘the satisfaction of knowing that they are directly giving pleasure to the men who are suffering untold hardships and risking their lives every day.’ The scheme’s overall target was 75,000 publications every week.

Another important charity was the War Horse appeal.

The collection of books and magazines for soldiers.

A postcard produced during the war. On 29 October 1914, The Times announced to its readers that at Lord Kitchener’s request a Smokes for Soldiers and Sailors Fund had been formed ‘to provide our wounded…with tobacco and cigarettes in hospitals here and at the front…and is at the moment sending regular supplies to over 200 hospitals and convalescent homes.’ Those who were serving at the front were not forgotten either. To make it easier for the public to send cigarettes and tobacco to members of the BEF, the Post Office allowed such ‘comforts’ to be mailed by the cheaper letter post instead of parcel post.

Open-air concerts were an ideal way to raise funds. A concert was given at the Town Clock by the massed bands of the Leatherhead Silver Band and the L.B. and S.C. Railway Prize Band from Croydon in September 1914. Patriotic music would be played whilst a collection was made. The September concert raised £5 5s for the Prince of Wales Relief Fund.

Collections for tobacco and cigarettes were well supported. One of the largest charities, the Smokes for Wounded Soldiers and Sailors Society (SSS) distributed more than a billion cigarettes to wounded men bought with funds raised through events such as ‘Fag Day’.

The British Royal family transformed its image through wartime charity work, developing a more personal relationship with the British public and distancing itself from European relations. Royal visitors boosted the morale of charity workers and encouraged public donations by meeting troops and volunteers, making personal appeals and lending their names as patrons. Royal visits featured in cinema newsreels, the new form of mass entertainment, and in the newspapers, which were read by almost all of the adult population.

King George V and Queen Mary visiting the troops in Woodcote Park. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

Initially the Queen had made an error of judgement as the Queen Mary’s Needlework Guild brought with it criticism that its creation had led to job losses. Many women in the textile and clothing industry had lost their jobs as export markets closed, and the guild posed a direct threat to their employment prospects. The War Emergency Workers’ National Committee, including leading figures from the labour movement, opposed it. To make amends their representatives were invited to the palace and the Queen’s Work for Women Fund was established to handle contracts from the Army Supply Department. The Queen personally placed an order for 75,000 woollen body belts as part of her Christmas gift to the troops.

For Leatherhead residents fundraising and donating became a regular part of daily life. The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser carried details of money and goods collected through dances, fetes and sales of produce and work. In the streets, posters advertised wartime charities, women sold lapel-pin flags from trays. Picture postcards were sold to raise funds and even small children, dressed as soldiers and nurses were used to tour pubs, clubs and factories.

Lady Arthur Paget was behind Russia Flag Day held on 18 November 1915 across the whole of the UK. The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser for 20 November 1915 reports Leatherhead’s part in the fund raising under the heading THE SCHOOL CHILDREN’S EFFORT. The popular Flag Day movement was organised to raise funds for the benefit of the Anglo-Russian Hospital in Petrograd, the wounded in Russia and the Russian prisoners in Germany.

Young boy dressed in his own miniature military uniform.

The Leatherhead Urban District Council took responsibility locally and encouraged local ladies, such as Mrs Leslie Dixon and the widow Katie Tinsley, to tour the town selling Russian flags. A well-attended concert was held in the Victoria Hall, the programme opening with the Russian National Anthem followed by glees and madrigals performed by pupils at the Royal School for the Blind. Miss Dolly Tutman, a ladies tailor, shown on the 1911 Census as Dorothy Tutman of 6 St John’s Road, Leatherhead is reported to have contributed ‘a capital interpretation’ of “The Women of Mumbles Head”. At first glance the poem is a curious choice given it tells the true story of two women, Jessie Ace and Margaret Wright, who saved the lives of German sailors.

Jessie and Margaret were the daughters of the Mumbles’ lighthouse keeper. On 27 January 1883, with the help of Gunner Hutchings from the lighthouse fort, the women rescued John Thomas and Williams Rosser, two of the lifeboat crew who had rescued the crew of the German barque, The Admiral Prinz Adalbert of Danzig. Unfortunately the lifeboat crew got into trouble themselves. The disaster took the lives of two of the coxswain’s sons, his son-in-law and another man. Both women received gold brooches from the Empress of Germany for looking after the barque’s crew. The poem was to be an inspiration to the audience of what women could achieve when ‘storms’ threatened the lives of their own men.

The Women of Mumbles Head by Clement Scott

Bring novelists your notebook. Bring Dramatists your Pen:

And I’ll tell you a simple story of what women do for men.

It’s only the tale of a lifeboat, of the dying and the dead,

Of a terrible storm and shipwreck that happened off Mumbles Head.

Maybe you have travelled in Wales, sir, and know it north and south:

Maybe you have friends with the ‘natives’ that dwell at Oystermouth.

It happens, no doubt, that from Bristol you’ve crossed in a casual way.

And have sailed your yacht in summer, in the blue of Swansea Bay.

Well, it isn’t like that in winter when the lighthouse stands alone,

In the teeth of Atlantic breakers that foam on its face of stone:

It wasn’t like that when the hurricane blew and the story-bell tolled, or when

There was news of a wreck, and lifeboat launch’d, and a desperate cry for men.

When in the world did the coxswain shirk? A brave old Salt was he!

Proud to the bone of as four strong lads, as ever had tasted the sea.

Welshmen all to the lungs and loins, who, about the coast ‘twas said,

Had saved some hundred lives apiece – at a shilling or so a head!

So the father launched the lifeboat in the teeth of the tempest’s roar,

And he stood like a man at the rudder, with any eye on his boys at the oar.

Out to the wreck went the father! Out to the wreck went the sons!

Leaving the weeping of women, and booming of signal guns; Leaving the mother who loved them, and the girls that the sailors loved,

Going to death for duty, and trusting to God above!

Do you murmur a prayer, my brother, when cosy and safe in bed,

For men like these, who are ready to die for a wreck off Mumbles Head?

It didn’t go well with the lifeboat. ‘Twas a terrible storm that blew!

And it snapped a rope in a second that was flung to the drowning crew;

And then the anchor parted – ’twas a tussle to keep afloat!

But the father stuck to the rudder, and the boys to the brave old boat.

Then at last on the poor doom’d lifeboat a wave broke mountains high!

‘God help us now! ‘said the father. ‘It’s over my lads, good-bye!’

Half of the crew swam shoreward, half to the sheltered caves,

But father and sons were fighting death in the foam of the angry waves.

Up at the lighthouse window two women beheld the storm,

And saw in the boiling breakers a figure – a fighting form,

It might be a grey-haired father, then the women held their breath,

It might be a fair-haired brother who was having a round with death;

It might be a lover, a husband, whose kisses were on the lips

Of the women whose love is life of the men going down to the sea in ships.

They had seen the launch of the lifeboat, they had heard the worst and more,

Then, kissing each other these women went down from the lighthouse, straight to the shore.

There by the rocks on the breakers these sisters, hand in hand,

Beheld once more that desperate man who struggled to reach the land.

’Twas only aid he wanted to help him across the wave,

But what are a couple of women with only a man to save?

What are a couple of women? Well, more than three craven men

Who stood by the shore with chattering teeth, refusing to stir – and then

Off went the women’s shawls, sir: in a second they’re torn and rent,

Then knotting them into a rope of love, straight into the sea they went!

‘Come back!’ cried the lighthouse keeper, ‘For God’s sake, girls, come back!’

As they caught the waves on their foreheads, resisting the fierce attack.

‘Come back!’ moaned the grey-haired mother as she stood by the angry sea,

‘If the waves take you, my darlings, there’s nobody left to me.’

‘Come back!’ said the three strong soldiers, who still stood faint and pale,

‘You will drown if you face the breakers! You will fall if you brave the gale!’

‘Come back’, said the girls, ‘we will not! Go tell it to all the town,

We’ll lose our lives, God willing, before that man shall drown!’

‘Give one more knot to the shawls, Bess! Give one strong clutch of your hand!

Just follow me, brave, to the shingle, and we’ll drag him safe to land!

Wait for the next wave, darling! Only a minute more,

And I’ll have him safe in my arms, dear, and we’ll drag him safe to shore.’

Up to their arms in the water, fighting it breast to breast,

They caught and saved a brother alive! God bless us! you know the rest—

Well, many a heart beat stronger, and many a tear was shed,

And many a glass was toss’d right off to the ‘Women of Mumbles Head!’

The concert continued with a selection of pictures presented by Harry Wright, the manager of the cinema. During the day every child at the local school had contributed a penny to the cause whilst the older scholars, under the direction of Edwin Burgess, headmaster and chairman of the Leatherhead Urban District Council, sold handmade items, from food to woollen waist belts ‘suitable for soldiers’, upon their stalls in the central hall. The younger children had performed songs and danced to ‘We are little soldiers’ and ‘Tipperary’.

Belgian refugees were also the subject of the first fundraising flag day in Glasgow on 3 October 1914. The Aberdeen Press and Journal said it was a great success, raising £5,874 6s 10d: ‘Of this amount, £169 10s was in gold and £2,724 in silver. Boxes of chocolates sold in the streets brought in £54 and over £10 was received from the sale of grapes. A number of Belgian refugees took part in the collection, including a child of three years, who comes from the Louvain district.’

Unlike Leatherhead’s successful activities some of the fund raising events across the UK were open to abuse. In response the War Charities Act 1916 made registration for public appeals compulsory and gave local authorities the power to decide which organisations would be registered or exempt. This local emphasis meant that there were wide variations in the way the Act was applied, especially in relation to defining a war charity, and to what constituted a public appeal.

The work of charities did not end with the Armistice in November 1918. Ex-servicemen faced hardship as war production gave way to a peacetime economy of high prices made worse by high unemployment. Ex-servicemen begging were a common sight, and wartime charities focused on providing for the millions disabled in the war; an example of this was the Ashtead Pottery in business between 1923 until 1935; its factory was set up with the aim of providing employment for disabled ex-servicemen.

Charities made up of ex-servicemen took on a campaigning role, representing a new attitude to voluntary action shaped by wartime experience. They focused on self-help and the demand to be treated as equals, their motto, ‘Don’t pity us, give us work’.

A selection of Ashtead Pottery created by disabled ex-servicemen. A display of Ashtead Pottery is held at Leatherhead Museum.

Egg Collection

Launched in November 1914 after an idea by Frederick Carl, editor of Poultry World, the National Egg Collection aimed to provide 20,000 newly-laid eggs a week to the wounded in hospital in Boulogne. By Easter 1915 the organisation was able to collect or purchase 200,000 eggs in one week. Ambitions increased again and by the middle of August 1915 over one million eggs were collected over seven days, assisted by the patronage of Queen Alexandra. Special boxes and labels were supplied (there were over 2,000 depots run by local groups and churches) and free transport was provided by the railways. A central collection point was established in London in a warehouse initially provided free of charge by Harrods. The public were discouraged from sending the eggs directly to their local hospitals. The collection had a wide appeal to all classes and ages but especially children, who were encouraged to donate their breakfasts to the cause.

The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of 19 December 1914 emphasised ‘if only every person who keeps fowls in Great Britain and Ireland would promise a few eggs each week, this pressing need of our wounded can be easily supplied.’

Mrs Leach of Vale Lodge organised for newly laid eggs in Leatherhead to go off to London Hospitals. The Parish Magazine of October 1915 reports that over 4,680 eggs had been dispatched. Postcards were produced, one of appeal to children showing a little chick looking up at her mother and saying: ‘Ma! Teach me how to lay an Egg – I want to do my bit for the wounded!’ The famous graphic artist, Donald McGill, produced a card aimed at a more mature audience. Egg services were being held in a number of churches and McGill’s card depicted a clergyman pronouncing from the pulpit: ‘It would greatly assist the collectors of eggs for the wounded soldiers if, upon coming to Church, each lady would lay an egg in the Font!’

Egg Collection for the wounded poster.

Advertisements would employ a mixture of patriotic idealism and emotional blackmail: ‘Do your duty by the wounded men. You cannot eat eggs and feel that the wounded are going without.’ Those not participating were deemed to be not worthy of the name ‘Britisher’.

Donors were encouraged to write their name and address on the eggs with a message for the wounded known as ‘eggograms’; the grateful recipient could then write to thank the sender. Such letters record the reception given to the arrival of fresh eggs in the hospitals. ‘I wish you could see the joy on the poor fellows’ faces when they get the eggs; it would fully repay you for all your trouble’ was a typical observation. Indeed, the morale-boosting aspect of the receipt of a fresh egg cannot be over-emphasised. It was estimated that an egg was placed in front of a wounded serviceman, even in France, within three days of being laid.

Collector’s Badge for the National Egg Collection for the Wounded.

As the war dragged on, the collection of eggs continued apace, though urgent representations were constantly being made for the number of gifts not to be decreased. Germany’s ‘devilish practice of sinking hospital ships’ meant that ‘thousands of wounded men cannot be brought home. In consequence the National Egg Collection must send at least 250,000 eggs weekly across the Channel. There is no substitute for eggs in maintaining a man’s vitality, hastening his convalescence or even in preserving life.’

Poster to encourage children to collect eggs for the wounded.

When the Armistice was signed on 11 November 1918 and the National Egg Collection effort was gradually wound down, drawing to a close on the last day of March 1919. Many collectors were issued with Certificates of Honour. Over 41 million eggs had been collected, of which no fewer than 32 million had been dispatched to the Base hospitals in France and Belgium. Its work finally over, the National Egg Collection was able to send a cheque for the cash balance of £5,865 to the War Office.

Some of the first to get involved in the war effort were the Leatherhead Boy Scouts. In August 1914, in response to concern over the poisoning of the water by enemy spies, the Leatherhead Waterworks Company was guarded day and night by the Boy Scouts and Church Lads’ Brigade. All the lads along with their officers took their turn in the shift rota, Scouts in the daytime and Church Lads in the night. It was not long before headmaster E.H. Burgess complained:

‘On Saturday last four boys of ten and eleven years of age had been on this duty… at the reservoirs and came down Highlands Road literally fagged out. There was no doubt the boys were too young for the work. They were little patriots in their own way, but at their age, they were not competent for this very important work.’

Leatherhead Council, once the problem had been highlighted, changed direction over the use of young boys to guard the reservoir and argued the Surrey Education Committee had sent out guidelines recommending only boys over fourteen to be utilised during school hours. Furthermore the council brought into question the role of the ‘wealthy’ waterworks company who should be responsible for protecting their facilities. A letter was forward from the council to the Leatherhead Waterworks and the debate over the use of boys, Special Constables or waterworks’ employees continued.

During 1910, Baden-Powell gave the Girl Scouts the name of Girl Guides. They were named after a famous corps of guides that Baden-Powell had worked with in India. He had learnt that even when these men were off-duty they still trained their minds and bodies. Therefore, he thought it would be an excellent choice of name for these pioneering young women. Quite often, the girls were known as Baden-Powell Girl Guides. The Girl Guide movement grew very quickly and Agnes Baden-Powell was made president of the new organisation.

The Guides practised such things as first aid and signalling. They also went camping, although they normally slept in barns, cowsheds or village halls instead of tents. At first, people didn’t like the idea of young ladies taking part in ‘boyish’ activities. Many people complained to Lord Baden-Powell about this. However, many of the skills the Guides had learnt became useful during the war and this helped to dispel a lot of the earlier hostility. Similar to her brother’s role with the Church Lads’ Brigade, Agatha Stenning was one of the leaders for the Nightingale Girl Guides of Leatherhead. These guides proudly marched together during Leatherhead’s Peace Celebrations.

Belgian Refugees

It is estimated up to 265,000 Belgians sought refuge in Britain, but this does not include 150,000 Belgian soldiers who had taken leave in Britain at one point in the war, or the 25,000 wounded Belgian soldiers convalescing in Britain, including The Red House Red Cross Hospital in Leatherhead.

Little could have prepared the port at Folkestone on 14 October 1914 when 16,000 Belgian refugees arrived in a single day. The exodus had started in August and the refugees continued to arrive almost daily for months, landing at other ports as well, including Tilbury, Margate, Harwich, Dover, Hull and Grimsby. In some purpose-built villages they had their own schools, newspapers, shops, hospitals, churches, prisons and police. These areas were considered Belgian territory and run by the Belgian government. They even used the Belgian currency. Few communities in the UK were unaffected by their arrival and Leatherhead was no exception. There is little to show they were in the area, apart from articles in the local papers about the ‘plucky little Belgians’ whose bravery and determination the British would share. If you didn’t have a refugee staying with you, you knew someone who did.

The Reverend E.A. Downes, headmaster of St John’s School, became the Chairman of Leatherhead’s Belgian Refugee Committee. In February 1915, thirty Belgian refugees arrived to take up home in three houses, on loan and rent free, from Mr Bulpin, Mrs Sackville Davis and the Chitty Trustees. One of the refugees was a Monsieur P. Dothey who wrote the following letter to Mr G.N. Chapman, the French-born, Leatherhead seed merchant and member of the refugee committee:

Belgian refugees arriving at Folkestone. (Alan Taylor/Screen South/Folkestone Town Council)

The request for gifts and loans of furniture and supplies for the homes of refugees. (DLA 16 January 1916)

Dear Sir

Please forgive me for asking you to be my interpreter and to convey to your Committee all our thanks and our deep gratitude for the very kind and cordial welcome we have found in Leatherhead. I was too much moved, at the time of our arrival, to be able to express to those ladies, who had the charming and delicate thought of waiting for us, all our sentiments towards them and towards the inhabitants of Leatherhead for their generous idea of welcoming into their midst the unfortunate Belgians exiled from their country.

Under the present circumstances our house here is in our eyes a real palace, where nothing is wanting – not even our glorious Flag that we cherish so dearly, nor the portraits of our King we adore, and of your King who personifies so well the sentiments of your noble Nation.

Pray believe how deeply all these attentions have moved us, and please convey our gratitude first to your Chairman and then to all those who have assisted him.

I am, dear Sir,

Yours faithfully,

P. Dothey

Early problems and lessons are suggested in a letter from ‘An admirer of the Belgians’ dated 29 October 1914 which appeared in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser. Mr Bulpin was thanked for offering up his house to Belgian refugees but the anonymous author also expressed the hope the newly formed Belgian Relief Committee would be organised more efficiently than the Leatherhead War Relief Committee had been for ‘the only way most of us knew there was such a fund was by seeing cards that were placed in the two banks’. The solution urged was the calling of a public meeting.

On 23 February 1915 a letter was read to the Local Government Board, from Mr S. Le Blanc Smith on behalf of the local Belgian Refugees Committee, asking the council to remit the rates on the three houses in use by the refugees. The board issued a circular letter stating they would not object to such a course if the auditor or any ratepayer did not object. However the Leatherhead Refugees Committee was not always efficient in its coordination; E.A. Downes publically apologised to the residents in January 1916 that the committee’s financial accounts were over two months late.

Further support from residents was requested in April 1916. A meeting was held at the Leatherhead Institute but it was poorly attended because of bad weather. At the meeting it was reported Leatherhead had offered hospitality to sixty-three refugees, of whom forty-three were still living in the town and funded by the relief committee. The ladies of the town organised a collection which raised over £1,301 and local dentists and doctors gave their time and professional services. The balance left by April 1915 was only £30 which, it was felt, would mean the refugees would need to leave the town unless more money could be raised. The meeting was reported in the 1 April edition of the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser alongside an urgent appeal for funds to support the ‘gallant Belgians’.

At the end of the war the British Government wanted its soldiers back home and the refugees to go home. This was in direct contrast to the overwhelming welcome the refugees received in 1914; a scuffle broke out in one town between people who wanted to carry a Belgian’s luggage for him. Britain in 1918 no longer felt obliged to help the refugees. Most people expected the war to be over by Christmas 1914 but it soon became clear that it wouldn’t. The longer the Belgians stayed the more difficult it became to maintain the funds required.

Leatherhead residents criticised the work of the relief committee. They believed the refugees had been earning money locally and received additional money from the committee, making them financially better off than many locals. The committee insisted that any refugee in work was only given a room to sleep and not money. The second criticism was aimed at the wives of Belgian officers who were said to be given money from the committee and their husbands. The committee asserted that any women no longer in need of support were not to receive aid from Leatherhead funds.

The relief committee went to great lengths to confirm the refugees were extremely grateful for the support they had received from Leatherhead residents and when the time came for them to return to Belgium they would help keep in the heart of the nation their love and admiration of England. Regardless of their gratitude, many Belgians had their employment contracts terminated, leaving them with little option but to go home. The government offered free one-way tickets back to Belgium, but only for a limited period. The aim was to get them to leave the country as quickly as possible. Within 12 months of the war ending an estimated 90 per cent had returned home. It also suited the Belgium government who needed people to return to rebuild the country.

The Red House Hospital

The Leatherhead division of the Red Cross covered Leatherhead, Bookham, Effingham, Stoke D’Abernon, Oxshott, Ashtead, Mickleham and Fetcham. This was a wide area but it only had one Red Cross hospital, opened at Bull Hill on 21 October 1914, aptly named the Red House Auxiliary Hospital. The house had been lent to the Red Cross by Mr John William Burton, whose son, Lieutenant John Stanley Burton, died at Ypres on 16 April 1916. The commandant of the hospital was Dr Dove, who was later to serve with the Army Medical Corps overseas, and the matron was Miss Bramwell.

Affiliated to the County of London War Hospital at Horton, Epsom, the Red House opened with twenty beds for wounded Belgian soldiers. Many of those treated were severe which accounted for the relatively low number of those treated compared to other Red Cross facilities. The nursing staff included a matron, three sisters, six members of the Surrey 22nd Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) and orderlies from the Surrey 17th VADs. By the end of March 1915 it had thirty-three beds and was fully occupied.

In 1916 the hospital offered thirty-six beds and 306 in-patients were treated. Many were severe cases who remained several months. The hospital also treated out-patients, eighty in 1916, who were men on leave, disabled soldiers or Army Service Corps men doing farm work. The Red House did not have an operating theatre or X-ray Department, but provided general treatment, massage and electrical treatments and later wound irrigation. By 1917 the number of beds was increased to forty. The extra beds, bedding and blankets were all supplied by local people.

The Red House closed on 14 February 1919. During its operational lifetime, 698 in-patients had been treated. The low number reflects the seriousness of many of the cases but despite this there were no deaths there. Overall 125 out-patients and fifty-two soldiers on the march had also received treatment.

It wasn’t only British and Belgian troops Leatherhead’s residents volunteered to help. In September 1915 the newspapers ran an appeal on behalf of Mrs Sackville Davis of Richmond House, Leatherhead, who was formerly acting as a nurse at the Red House Hospital. Mrs Sackville Davis had volunteered to go overseas to the Anglo-French Hospital at Quimper. She asked the Leatherhead residents to provide items such as ‘small arm cushion covers (about 16 by 12 inches, made of unbleached calico or any washing material), felt slippers (large size), socks, handkerchiefs, scarves, games (especially jig-saws), wool and knitting needles for the men to use themselves. Mrs Davis wrote:

Auxiliary hospitals and convalescent homes such as The Red House were vital, temporary facilities for wounded servicemen. (Red Cross Archive)

‘Any kind friends who will send any of these to Richmond House during September (at the end of which month they will be forwarded via the French Red Cross Society to Hospital 20 Quimper) will have the satisfaction of knowing that their gifts will be very greatly appreciated by the French soldiers, who are so patient in their sufferings and so appreciative of anything done for their comfort.’

Early in October 1917 the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser reported on a presentation made to Dr Dove by the members of the 17th Surrey VAD, assembled in full force at the Institute. This was a farewell gathering because he had taken a commission as a medical officer in the Army. Dr Dove had started at the Red House when it was opened in 1914. Colonel Guise presided over the gathering, complimenting the doctor on all his hard work and presenting him with a silver pocket flask. W.T. Limming, who had been a quartermaster at the hospital, was home on leave from France and informed the gathering of the Red Cross work in France. The musical programme was contributed to by Colonel Guise, Dr Dove, the Reverend A.P. Blackburne, Mr W.R. Hewlins, Mr S.R. Drake and Mr W.A. Chitty, with accompaniments by Mr L.A. Dearle.

A concert to raise money for the Red House Hospital, 4 October 1918. Many of the songs had a military and patriotic theme.

Leatherhead also had its own Red Cross War Hospital Supply Work Rooms at 11 High Street, Leatherhead which opened for several hours each week day. The workers made bandages for the wounded. The fee for Leatherhead’s registration was 2/6 in return for which the group was sent a small Red Cross flag, bearing their registered number, labels for dispatch of their supplies direct to the stores department, papers giving the conditions under which their respective members could qualify for certificates and voluntary workers’ badges, and periodical information as to hospital requirements.

Private Jack Worsfold and the 5th East Surrey Regiment

The volunteer movement began in Leatherhead around the time of the Second Boer War 1899–1902. At this time it had sixty volunteers, known as ‘Saturday night soldiers’, their drill hall was eventually built in Poplar Road. The company gradually dwindled to less than twenty men attached to B Company of the 5th East Surrey Regiment of the Territorial Force. Lieutenant Chetwynd Stapylton was in charge of the company.

By 1914 the Territorials had become an exciting means of escape from life in Leatherhead for many young men. Service in the Territorials at the very least involved an annual camp outside of the county, an opportunity seldom enjoyed by the poorer members of the community. Fifty thousand Territorials were in summer camp in 1914 on Salisbury Plain. Jack Worsfold of B Company of the 5th East Surrey Regiment was among them and one of numerous lads from Leatherhead. Jack was the son of William and Jane Worsfold who lived in Bridge Street along with his five siblings: William, Frank, Howard, younger sister Nell and younger brother Ernest. The 1911 Census shows William senior and two of his sons, William and Frank, were chimney sweeps, Howard was a gardener’s boy and Jack was a firewood chopper. At some point after the spring of 1914 Howard moved to Canada.

Ernest was the only brother, aged fourteen, who was not eligible to join the services. In his recollections of that summer Jack was later to write: ‘We were in training, equipped and mobilised, little knowing that our fourteen days away from homes and jobs were to become four years.’

Jack tells of how excited the Territorials were that war had broken out and to mark the occasion a huge stack of firewood, over thirty feet high, was lit and illuminated Stonehenge for miles. On 5 August B Company of the 5th East Surreys were sent to Stroud in Kent and dispersed into their billets. Jack was impressed with how efficiently they were looked after, given the unique nature of the emergency. The following day Jack was sent with his company on a five-mile march and posted to guard public buildings, bridges and prisons. It was at this stage he wrote to his new prospective employer to confirm he would not be able to start work owing to the war. His boss replied, confirming his job would be open upon his return and also sent him cigarettes.

The Worsfold brothers. From left to right: Private Jack Worsfold, Sergeant Frank Worsfold and Corporal William Worsfold. William was with the 1st Battalion of the East Surrey Regiment, serving in France, when he was killed in action on 21 August 1918 in Bapaume. William had been a volunteer fireman in Leatherhead before the war. Three Worsfold brothers served in India during the war. (Mrs Betty Worsfold & Janice Steele/Taken Not Given, Liam Sumption, Leatherhead and District Local History Society)

Whilst in Kent, Jack visited Maidstone and met his brother who was guarding a gas works. Jack wrote, ‘All kinds of rumours were floating around, orders given and cancelled galore.’

The Territorials were listed for Home Defence and could only be sent overseas if they volunteered to go. Those who volunteered were given an Imperial Service Badge, although the colonel insisted the regiment would be in disgrace if they did not do their bit to fight off the enemy at the gate. Initially Jack was only eighteen and therefore did not qualify to serve overseas until he was nineteen. He wrote of his disappointment: ‘As soon as I could, I asked the Captain if there was any chance of my getting through as both my brothers would be going, but he said he could do nothing at all. That was the blackest day for me since being away.’

Jack’s brother Frank did not go overseas immediately as he was ordered to stay behind as the younger Territorials needed NCOs to supervise them. Several weeks went by before Jack was able to get a pass to visit his family in Leatherhead. Upon his arrival he discovered his brother, Howard, was in Britain serving with the Canadian forces. His weekend leave was the first of only two visits to Leatherhead before he was posted to India on 29 October 1914. ‘We had no idea of our needs, and some would like to have taken all sorts of things from pianos and motorcycles to young ladies and pets.’

On his second visit Jack was exceptionally pleased to be home, but he had no idea he would be away for four years. The 5th East Surrey Territorials arrived back at Leatherhead ‘like a troop of schoolboys’ and surprised their families. Jack met up with his sweetheart and was able to go on their favourite walk and sit on the Mole Bridge. When it was time to leave the town band turned out at the station to play them off to Canterbury. Jack’s account finishes with the evening of 24 October 1914:

The Territorial Force Imperial Service Badge awarded to members of the Territorial Force (TF) who were prepared to serve outside the United Kingdom in defence of the Empire and was worn on the uniform immediately above the right hand breast pocket. The conditions of enlistment for the TF, laid down at their creation in 1908, did not allow for soldiers to be sent for service overseas against their will, as the TF was intended for home defence. However, any man could volunteer for the Imperial Service Section and serve abroad in times of war, which entitled him to wear the badge.

‘We go to Cawnpore, a very hot place in central India… Tonight the officers celebrated in the mess with a big smash up, tearing the cane armchairs to pieces, with battles in the drawing room, smashing two windows. They are still at it now and I pity the room when they have finished.’

Jack landed at Bombay on 2 December 1914, his division was broken up and posted to the Allahabad Brigade in 8th (Lucknow) Division, until August 1915 when he went into the Nowshera Brigade of the 1st (Peshawar) Division. In May 1916 Jack’s unit was attached to the 2nd (Rawalpindi) Division but returned to the Nowshera Brigade in October 1916, then onto the 7th (Meerut) Divisional Area in April 1917. In December 1917 Jack found himself in Mesopotamia before moving back to India in February 1918.

Still only 18 and technically too young to go abroad, Jack wrote to his family of his travels to India. His long letter was published in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of December 1914. His account is bursting with insights into distant places:

‘The waiting at Port Said was not at all monotonous, as we saw so many sights which only occur in that one port in all the world, and which were even far too vivid to explain correctly either by words or pictures, cinematographs always seem to me to explain foreign scenery so plainly, but now I have seen and heard together.’

Jack’s account must have been especially fascinating for the young men at home, who not only knew him, but felt they too wanted to enlist to share the adventure. His letter is full with descriptions of sandy deserts, clusters of palms and jabbering, barefoot natives. To explore the mainland boats were lowered from the ship so the men could row ashore, even this Jack describes as ‘ripping fun’ and ‘the experience of our lives’ despite the lack of sleep and being stranded ashore where ‘the wind and sand had done their work and we were more like Arabs’.

A postcard of Port Said as Jack Worsfold would have seen it in 1914.

Jack, Frank and Howard survived the war but William was killed in action on 21 August 1918.

Volunteering for Kitchener’s New Army

Field Marshal Earl Kitchener predicted a long and brutal war, contrary to the popular belief that the conflict would be over by Christmas 1914. Kitchener argued a force of new, well-trained and well-led divisions would win the war and believed the Territorials (TF) would not be the basis of the New Army; he had opposed the formation of the Territorials in 1908. In Kitchener’s opinion the Territorials had signed up for Home Service and were therefore unsuitable for overseas duties. He also felt French Territorials had proved inadequate during previous conflicts. In the early days of the war, the Territorial Force could not reinforce the Regular Army, as it lacked modern equipment, particularly artillery. The volunteers recruited into the New Army were used to form complete battalions under existing British Army regiments. The first New Army divisions were used at the Battle of Loos in September 1915 and later at the Battle of the Somme in July 1916. Early in the conflict it was believed the war could be fought using only volunteers but by 1916 conscription was seen as a necessity. The queues at the recruitment offices had dwindled as information about the true nature of the war began to percolate through, and enthusiasm for volunteering plummeted. Britain eventually resorted to conscription, like the other great powers even before the war.

Until conscription was introduced the papers kept up the pressure for men to enlist. In November 1914 the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser under the headline ELEVEN HUNDRED MILES OF ENEMY reported that ‘the Recorder of Kingston-on-Thames said on Monday that standing shoulder to shoulder in a double rank the German Army would extend in a straight line for eleven hundred miles, while the British forces in double rank would only reach from London to Slough.’

Army Council poster emphasising the terms of enlistment.

From Young Offender to Volunteer Hero

Percy Friday was born on 2 April 1895 to Charles and Helen Friday who were both from long established Leatherhead families and living at 8 St John’s Terrace in 1911. The census shows Charles and Helen had eight children, but by 1911 only four were still living. Percy, like his father, was a general labourer.

The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of 17 August 1912 reported Percy’s appearance at the Epsom Petty Sessions for criminal damage to the alder trees of Randall Park and trespassing onto the property of Mr A.H. Henderson. Percy had thrown doubt on his innocence at the scene by claiming his name was Arthur Sayers of 5 Kings Lea, Leatherhead. Percy and his friend, Leonard Godfrey Penfold, were discharged with a caution having stated they were going to the river to bathe and found a bonfire of alder trees already alight.

A month later, September 1912, Percy joined the 1st Battalion of the East Surrey Regiment. When war broke out his medal roll shows he embarked for France with the British Expeditionary Force on 16 August 1914, almost two years to the day after the Randalls Park incident. His friend, Leonard, joined the 1st Battalion of the Queen’s (Royal West Surrey) Regiment between February and July 1914, enlisting at Kingston. Leonard went missing during the First Battle of the Ypres; his death is recorded as 29 October 1914 and his brother Benjamin died on 13 September 1915. Both are commemorated on the Leatherhead War Memorial. Their twin brothers, Sydney and Arthur, joined the Royal Field Artillery together and both survived the war.

The Friday family, like many others across the nation, submitted Percy’s letters home to the local newspaper; this seldom happened in the national press for security reasons. Percy may well have seen his own letter in the paper as local newspapers were available to the fighting troops. In effect Percy and his fellow soldiers would take part in a battle and then read about themselves a few days later. Soldiers also learnt of the deaths of their family and friends from the newspapers; Percy most likely discovered Leonard had gone missing from the newspapers.

People at home were usually very keen to hear about what was happening on the front lines, especially from those they knew. Percy would have been limited by censorship and his own judgement on what relatives and friends should be told about his experiences. His letter, dated 30 October 1914, was published in the 14 November 1914 edition of the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser:

‘Just a few lines to let you know that I am still alive and well, but we must thank God for that, not only me, but all that are left of my regiment, especially after Wednesday’s fighting. I had just gone to make a dish of tea for my section when a shell from the Germans’ siege gun fell in a ditch just a few yards from where I was lying. Three men were killed and four wounded. They were all buried alive, but we dug the wounded out of the hole, which was four to six feet deep. As for the poor chaps who were killed, I had better not say anything about them, as it nearly broke our hearts to see them. They were revenged, however, as the Germans have made several charges and been driven back with heavy losses. They are getting it hot from our fellows.

The only thing we don’t like is not knowing where we are; but one thing we do know is that we have got the enemy back to the Belgian frontier. Will you kindly send me a small wooden pipe and a few more cigarette papers? I have got plenty of tobacco, but I lost my pipe in action.’

The 2 January 1915 edition of the newspaper published another of Percy’s letters home – possibly aware of a wider audience than his immediate family he encouraged those at home to stay positive:

‘I hope you are getting better weather than we are. It is so bad here that we have to bale the water out of the trench and the mud is knee deep. There is not much hope of getting home for Christmas, but we must all make the best of it this year. I hope the Kaiser has plenty of three penny pieces in his Christmas pudding, and that they choke the poor fellow.’

Within a week of the letter’s publication, the 9 January 1915 edition reported Percy was hospitalised ‘somewhere’ in England, suffering from pleurisy.

The Military Medal awarded to Private Percy Friday.

Leatherhead recruitment poster.

By spring of 1915, the publication of letters such as Percy’s was discouraged and the Army was also able to ban newspaper journalists from visiting and reporting on the front-line troops. Instead, armies and navies issued official communiqués and effectively wrote their own version of battles for the newspapers to publish. Eventually, in response to complaints, official uniformed war correspondents were posted to report for the major newspapers.

Percy Friday recovered from pleurisy and was posted to Dover on Home Service before returning to the Front in 1916. In August 1916 the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser reported that Percy, now a corporal, had been wounded and was in hospital in Birmingham. This time a deliberately short notice simply states: ‘wounded in the advance’. Patched up again, the next news of Percy appears in the 31 August 1918 edition of the paper; he had been awarded the Military Medal ‘for a gallant act and devotion to duty on May 19th near Albert’. No details were given as to why he had won the medal but yet again Percy was in hospital, this time Horton Hospital in Epsom. Percy had been in and out of the front line for four years. Despite his ordeal he lived a long life back in Surrey until his death in March 1978, aged 82.

The Attestation of Volunteer Frank Augustus Hollis

The Surrey Recruitment Registers for 11 December 1915 contain the recruitment and attestation in Leatherhead of Frank Augustus Hollis, a clerk, of 2 Allsopp Cottages, Buckhold Road, Wandsworth. A note in the Leatherhead History Society Archives states Frank Hollis was the first person to be recruited from the Leatherhead Army Recruiting Office in Bridge Street. Church records show that Frank was baptised in Battersea on 29 March 1894, the son of Frank, a grocer and Frances Hollis. Frank was to survive the war and in 1921 marry Hilda Mary Barnard, a dressmaker who was living in Hampton Cottage Leatherhead, the present day Leatherhead Museum.

Frank joined the 16th Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers and was allocated the service number 7693. He went on to join the 8th Battalion, Royal Welch Fusiliers (RWF) as Private 30164. His medal cards list the award of the Victory and British Medals after the war, indicating he saw active service overseas. From February 1916 onwards the 8th Royal Welch Fusiliers served in Mesopotamia with the 13th Divison. The remarks on his medal roll ‘Con. Depot as Officer’s Svt.’ indicate Frank was a batman to an army officer in the Battalion’s Convalescent Depot. Frank would have written home to his family from places such as Baghdad.

Sergeant A. Evans of the West Surrey Regiment & Clerk A. Brown outside the Leatherhead Recruitment Office in Bridge Street.

Frank Hollis and the medal roll showing his award of the Victory and British Medals.

In 1960 Frank and Hilda purchased Hampton Cottage. Frank died in 1969 and Hilda 1977 and are buried in Leatherhead’s church of St Mary and St Nicholas, where they were married.

British soldiers on the march in Mesopotamia.

Church Street 1895. Hampton Cottage the smallest property on the left, now Leatherhead Museum, was home to Hilda and Frank Hollis. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

Hilda Hollis (nee Barnard) dressmaker of Hampton Cottage. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

Frank Hollis in the garden of Hampton Cottage. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

Rifle Clubs

At the beginning of the war there were numerous calls for local rifle clubs to become town guards. John St Loe Strachey (1860–1927) publically announced his support for the rifle clubs to volunteer for this role. Strachey was a British journalist, newspaper proprietor and High Sheriff of Surrey in 1914. Between 1887 and 1925, Strachey was editor of The Spectator and believed there was no more worthy calling for anyone who wished to serve his country than journalism in order to be ‘the watch-dog of society’, even if it made him unpopular. His support for the rifle clubs’ role on the home front made him unpopular and no more so than with the clubs themselves. In September 1914 Strachey’s views were published locally:

‘Though there are several notable exceptions, I regret to say that a considerable majority of the Surrey Rifle Clubs have informed me through their secretaries that they are unable to fall in with my suggestions for forming Town Guards and Village Guards within the Rifle Clubs from among the men over thirty years of age.’

Strachey expressed his view of a misunderstanding between the rifle clubs and his intention. The clubs believed starting such a scheme had been discouraged by the Press Bureau. Strachey insisted he did not want to interfere with the enlistment of men of military age but wanted to encourage men who did not qualify for military service to help guard the towns. Strachey cited Lord Roberts, a former commander-in-chief of the British Army, as someone who had previously encouraged the drilling of rifle club members. However this was not applicable to men over military age and Lord Roberts, as a former commander-in-chief of the British Army, was cited as encouraging drilling by rifle clubs.

John St Loe Strachey – High Sheriff of Surrey.

Strachey’s calls for a civil defence scheme to utilise the rifle clubs were doomed to failure. But the Volunteer Training Corps was more successful and many of those in the rifle clubs supported the VTC.

The Dorking and Leatherhead Battalion of the Volunteer Training Corps

On 24 April 1915 Lord Desborough and the Lord Lieutenant of Surrey, Colonel the Hon. H. Cubitt CB, made a speech to the Volunteer Training Corps (VTC).

Desborough was keen to express his belief that the VTC had become a ‘very living entity’. Dorking and Leatherhead and the surrounding villages has been allotted a battalion, one of the many Surrey enjoyed. Those who enrolled made themselves available for home defence in the event of an invasion. The VTC was particularly attractive to older members of the community who had previous experience in the Army. Of immediate concern was the guarding of railways, bridges and other vulnerable points. Early in the war those duties had been performed by men of the regular forces, but with the VTC’s involvement, the regulars could be released to carry out more effective work.

1st Baron Desborough, William Henry Grenfell 1921.

On the night of 24 April 1915 the volunteers marched over from Leatherhead to attend the meeting and form a guard of honour in Dorking High Street. The local VTC members had already been brushing up their drill at the Forty Foot Road Recreation Ground in Leatherhead on Mondays and Wednesdays between 7pm and 10pm.

Father of ten, William Yardley was one of the earliest members of the Leatherhead VTC and as such his obituary states that he was held in high regard by other residents. He worked during the daytime as an electrical contractor and lived at 4 Church Street. Before the war William had demonstrated his commitment to the community by providing the ‘electrical effects’ for the local Leatherhead Amateur Dramatic and Operatic Society’s performance of Gilbert and Sullivan’s ‘The Gondoliers’, to raise money for the Cottage Hospital. According to the 1911 Census, Mr Yardley and his wife, Jessie, had lost two children by 1911, but this was not the last time the family was to suffer the hardships of the era.

Henry Cubitt, 2nd Baron Ashcombe.

Approved Volunteer Training Corps uniforms, published February 1915.

William and Jessie’s son Stanley Yardley signed up for the Queen’s (Royal West Surrey) Regiment, at Guildford on 22 February 1915, around the same time as his father was doing his bit for the home front by joining the VTC and guarding local railway lines and bridges. Stanley was killed on the First Day of the Somme, 1 July 1916. William died suddenly on 9 December 1918, aged only 54, the newspapers reporting ‘a short illness’. His VTC colleagues provided a firing party in his honour at his funeral in December. Jessie was left alone to provide for her surviving family of seven.

It is likely William Yardley was one of those inspected, after Lord Desborough had dined at the Red Lion Hotel, Dorking. The VTC formed up in the High Street, the total muster being about 200. Lord Desborough would have been a particularly impressive visitor to inspect the Volunteers as he was already the celebrated president of the 1908 London Olympic Games and of the Lawn Tennis Association. An ideal inspiration for what men could achieve, he had swum the Niagara rapids, climbed the Matterhorn and rowed across the English Channel.

Proficiency Badge of the Volunteer Training Corps, depicting the war goddess Bellona.

Addressing the audience, the Lord Lieutenant, Henry Cubitt, 2nd Baron Ashcombe, referred to the lukewarm attitude of the government towards the Volunteer movement in August 1914, but there was now a recognition that the civilians in Britain were prepared to shoot if the country was invaded. The War Office had got as much on their hands as they could possible tackle and it was also obvious if the VTC was to be recognised it must be organised from the outside. Luckily, according to Cubitt, Lord Desborough had offered his services. After Cubitt’s speech forms were circulated at the meeting for those who had yet to enrol.

A volunteer of the Volunteer Training Corps. (Tony Allen – Picture Postcards from the Great War 1914-18)

Lord Desborough accepted with very great pleasure the invitation of the Lord Lieutenant. He stressed the gravity of the situation in which they found themselves. The country was now conducting nine campaigns by land and holding the seven seas, imposing enormous strains on the country in terms of men and materials and those of the Allies. He argued the Germans were a formidable people who proved they meant to live by war. This was the fourth time they had attacked Europe; they were a fighting nation. He did not suppose there was anyone present who had not a relative or a friend facing all the dangers at the Front. When the war was over the question would be asked ‘What have you done to help your country and those who have been fighting with us?’ Many in the audience were too old or ‘too ugly’, he joked, to go the Front but by joining the VTC they would play their part. The Leatherhead and Dorking VTC had already been called out because of a Zeppelin air raid scare.

At first the authorities did not look upon the movement with great favour and the VTC was told to wait and not interfere with the work of the Army. It was feared the movement would shelter younger men from going into the forces. In response the leaflet of the Association plainly stated their first duty was to do everything they possibly could to assist recruiting for the regular forces of the Crown. If a VTC member did not wear their brassard on their uniform they would be fined 10s by the Chief Constable. Desborough urged that they should be proud of the brassard and not try to hide their membership of the VTC.

Between them Lord Desborough and Colonel Cubitt would lose five sons to the war. At the time his speech in Leatherhead Lord Desborough was married to Ethel Fane and they had five children. Two of their sons, Julian and Gerald, died in the war. Henry Cubitt was married to Maud Marianne Calvert with whom he had six sons, three of whom were killed in action.

Septimus Wellings and the VTC

Septimus Wellings (1850–1935), born in Ashtead, worked for Emily Moore at the Swan Hotel as a cellar man and had been in the employ of Abraham Dixon of Cherkley Court. The census shows Septimus’s mother was a cook at the Swan and his son Percival was a cellar man before becoming a mental nurse at the Horton Mental Asylum. In 1884 Septimus was appointed the Relieving Officer at the Epsom Union and made responsible for support in cash and kind to the poor in the Leatherhead district.

Septimus Welling, the Relieving Officer at the Epsom Union, distributing financial support to Leatherhead residents. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

King Edward VII, when lunching at the Swan on Derby Day had commented of Septimus Wellings’ appearance that he ‘would make a damn fine bishop’. In 1911 Septimus was living at Ellengowan, The Crescent, Leatherhead and as he was already in his sixties when war broke out, he joined the Leatherhead VTC. This was not his only contribution to Leatherhead’s war effort as he also filled in for the Registrar of Births, Marriages and Deaths. He also took part in the peace celebrations in Leatherhead 1919.

From Easter 1916 there was a turning point as the War Office recognised them as soldiers, so they no longer needed to wear an armband to show who they were. After a period of military discipline they could become civilians again and many resigned. Slowly the independent corps began to become volunteer battalions of the local regiments. Rules were laid down to secure efficiency and discipline as conditions of recognition, and the Volunteers were divided into four categories. Category A were those who undertook to serve as Volunteers until the end of the war. These men were fully recognised by the government and provided with equipment and eventually uniform. Category B were men of military age but exempt from service. These men were liable to be withdrawn from the Volunteers and sent abroad if their tribunal exemption was withdrawn. Category C were boys under military age and category D, those with no obligations who could leave the Volunteers at two days’ notice.

Septimus Wellings wearing the uniform of the Volunteer Training Corps in Leatherhead. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

Parade announcements, 6 February 1915. (Dorking & Leatherhead Advertiser)

Label on reverse of postcard – Church Lad’s Brigade on Vicarage Lawn probably 1912-13. Vicar Rev. T.F. Hobson in cap on right (Bernard Hobson, aged 4, ‘mascot’, on his knee). Bernard Stenning – in command – just to left of drums and Rev. B. Pitts next to him. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

The Church Lads’ Brigade

The Leatherhead Company of the Church Lads’ Brigade would join their fellow members from the Southern District and venture out for a week each year at summer camp. In 1908 the camp took place in Bognor and attracted over 600 boys. Bognor was chosen as it was ‘especially suited for sham-fighting and excellent for bathing’; these were activities the boys had very little opportunity to enjoy other than through membership of the brigade. A typically exhausting day at camp started at 5am followed by parades, drill, inspection, football matches and guard duty. Lights out was sounded by the bugle at 10.15pm.

Throughout the war, as soon as the brigade lads were old enough, they would enlist in the Army. Bernard Stenning, the commander, was often thanked by Army officers for the ready supply of such well trained and disciplined young men.

Special Constables

Early in the war men flooded the local police stations to offer to join the Specials. Names and addresses were collected and they were told which police station to attend to be sworn in. Age restrictions were flexible and provided he was in good health any man could join. The special constables for Leatherhead were sworn in at the council offices before Mr A.H. Tritton and the Reverend St Clare Hill. Mr W. Coleridge was appointed chief officer of the forty-four special constables sworn in for the Leatherhead district.

Recruitment poster for Special Constables in Surrey.

Arthur David Childs, in police sergeant’s costume, who lived alone at 4 Clinton Road, Leatherhead, a widower who joined the Leatherhead Drama and Operatic Society and worked as a warehouse man.

Recruitment Poster for Special Constables ‘Every Copper Helps’.

Opinion varied with regard to the value of the work performed by the Special Constables. Their work often took place in difficult circumstances, between 10pm and 6am and in bad weather. Most of the men were engaged in their various occupations throughout the day and were asked to go on duty through the night.

Such was the level of paranoia about German spies, the local papers reported in September 1914 that the special constables of Leatherhead were engaged in guarding the waterworks and reservoirs. One Monday afternoon Special Constable J. Cowan saw a well-dressed man making a sketch of the Leatherhead and South West Railway Bridge which spans the River Mole. Mr Cowan’s suspicions were aroused and he took the man to Leatherhead police station. Enquiries were made and the stranger was soon able to establish his identity as an innocent London Council School teacher, who was on holiday to follow his hobby of sketching. The census records show Mr Cowan was the outdoor superintendent for the waterworks, and Leatherhead’s Chief Fire Officer. With hindsight he was possibly a little too zealous in his handling of the situation but it does demonstrate the unexpected treatment strangers to the area could experience.

The need for fund raising did not end with the war. In December 1921 a Japanese Fair was held at the Institute Hall to raise enough money to prevent it from closure. The Institute survives to this day.

CHAPTER 3

Young Men Passing Through

The local young men who were serving with the Territorials had already left Leatherhead by August 1914. With the declaration of war came the arrival of other soldiers, destined for training camps in and around the local area. Soldiers in training became a common sight as they prepared for service overseas. These young men, often with unfamiliar accents, marched and drilled through the town and countryside often without uniforms and with pieces of wood as imitation rifles. The residents opened their homes as billets and did all they could to make them feel welcome.

The arrival of the University and Public Schools (UPS) Battalion

Advertisements for junior officers began to appear in the national newspapers and on posters from 10 August 1914. The War Office was offering 2,000 temporary commissions to unmarried men aged between seventeen and thirty. This offer was extended to cadets and ex-cadets of the University Officer Training Corps (OTC) or members of universities and other young men of good general education. So great was the response, coupled with pressure from those over thirty years old, it was soon clear there would not be enough temporary commissions to satisfy demand.

Parliamentary Recruiting Committee Poster, 1915.

During a meeting at Claridge’s Hotel in London, a scheme was created to raise a regiment of 5,000 men. These five battalions would ensure a great number of public school boys would be able to serve together, especially as some of them were ‘somewhat chary of joining the regular army with the ordinary run of recruits’. The Public School Year-book, with a pool of over 30,000 members, was the basis for inclusion into the plan for a University and Public Schools Battalion to become part of Lord Kitchener’s New Army.

The benefits to the War Office included the UPS’s offer to recruit and carry out their own medical examinations in line with War Office instructions and provide at least 5,000 men within a fourteen-day period. A copy of their plan was placed before Lord Kitchener and he wrote by return with the message: ‘Go ahead, and if you can raise 10,000 men I shall be all the better pleased.’

Within a week recruiting offices were opened in over fifty towns including Guildford, Redhill and Reigate. Funds were raised from a letter to headmasters of public schools asking for a subscription of a guinea towards the expenses of recruiting. With an immediate response from forty-five headmasters, most of the initial expenses were covered. The UPS motto, reported in The Devon and Exeter Gazette, was ‘For King and Country and School’. The rush of recruits exceeded all expectations. On the first day, 1 September 1914 there were over 300 applicants and by 12 September 1914 the total number of recruits had exceeded 5,000 and a waiting list was created.

The Woodcote Park Committee based in Epsom agreed to lend, free of charge, a portion of their estate at Woodcote Park, for the purpose of building a camp. It was not possible to erect enough huts in time for the arrival of the new recruits so it was agreed the brigade should be billeted and trained in Epsom, Ewell, Ashtead and Randalls Park, Leatherhead. With so many men billeted in the area, an unexpected £3,500 a week was forthcoming for local landladies, more than compensating for the loss of tourist trade. The only assistance from the War Office was the provision of special trains.

The First Advertisement for the UPS Brigade.

The majority of the mobilisation took place on two dates, 18 September 1914 for men living in London and 24 September for men enlisted from the provinces. Notices were sent to every man by post, telling him what to bring, the date, time and place of mobilisation, and also a label bearing a letter and number to be attached to his bag. The number of absentees at roll calls on the mornings of departure was remarkably small. A column of motor buses took the London men from Hyde Park to Epsom with parents, relatives and sightseers making it difficult to efficiently parade the men.

The Departure for Epsom, 18 September 1914.

The second portion of men mobilised came from all parts of the British Isles and proceeded to Ashtead to become the 21st Battalion. On 24 September 1914 the last detachment went from Manchester to Leatherhead. The Manchester recruits were from the grammar school, university law students, chartered accountants, incorporated accountants and architects who came together to form the majority of those of the 20th Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers. The 18th, 19th and half of the 20th Royal Fusilier Battalions were billeted in Epsom. Ashtead became the home of the 21st Battalion and Leatherhead the remaining half of the 20th Battalion.

The following account appeared in the Epsom Herald regarding the arrival of the UPS:

‘Epsom was invaded on Friday, but not by the Germans. Through its streets there was the march of many men, but they were the sons of the British Empire. And though none of the 3,250 carried a rifle, and few were in khaki, they all hope to be across the water and face to face with German hosts in unusually quick time. For they are very keen to be in the fighting line, are those who bear with them the stamp of a vigorous, healthy, athletic life spent in the playing-fields of England, and on its rivers. … The men arrived at the Downs Station in special trains, and they marched via College Road and Alexandra Road to the wide part of the High Street. Train after train landed them at the foot of the Downs, and in all about 3,200 arrived on Friday.’

UPS Royal Fusiliers awaiting a train to Leatherhead.

An Early Day in Camp, Woodcote Camp Epsom.

Special constables, mobilised for the arrival of the UPS, acted as guides. The Epsom Herald pointed out their suspicion that many of the recruits were under age to serve:

‘It may be that all the members of the Old Public School and University Men’s Force are nineteen years old, but, if so, several of them are extraordinary young-looking for their age. Some, when getting sworn in, may have forgotten the year of their nativity. If so, we are sure the good angels who desire to see the righteous cause of the Allies triumph turned a blind eye to any little defect of memory.’

Waterloo House, Epsom High Street, became the brigade office and the Tun beer-house opposite became the brigade post office. Various Leatherhead societies and clubs placed their rooms at the disposal of the members of the brigade. Numerous friendships were made between the local residents and the soldiers; later when on leave from the Front, the soldiers would return to visit their old billets and friends. Leatherhead became a special home from home for those unable to get enough leave to travel to the north of the country.

The billeting arrangements were recorded in The Standard, of 1 October 1914:

‘At Leatherhead the accommodation of the contingent stationed there is said to be admirable, and the men say that they are being most hospitably treated. They are billeted in larger houses, and the motherly housewives cannot do too much to make as comfortable as possible the lads who have wrenched themselves away from their homes to take up service for their country… Leatherhead seems to be drill mad. As soon as one arrives at the station any time before sunset he hears the eternal “Left, right! Left right!” and military orders smartly rapped out.’

The UPS Brigade Office at Waterloo House, Epsom.

The Tun Beer-house (centre), Epsom 1905.

Church Parade for the UPS Brigade before the issue of uniforms.

Private William M. Horne in a letter to The Whitby Gazette commented that their day began at 7am with physical drill followed by breakfast at 8am. Drill then resumed until 9.30am with dinner at 12.15pm and a rest until 2.30pm when the whole battalion ‘fell in’ on the parade ground for a route march until 5pm. When dismissed they were free until the next morning. Horne was reminded of his school days at the North-Eastern County Schools Officers’ Training Corps except whilst they shirked at school it was certainly no longer the case given that they were called upon to face the ‘tactics of the Huns’. Horne comments: ‘It is glorious marching along these lovely lanes of Surrey, with their lofty trees, and high over-hanging hedges off which we manage to gather brambles as we pass.’

Whilst the brigade was in training during the early days they were still in mufti, some wore their old school scarves and sweaters. The most popular hats were the golf-cap, worn over the left ear, and clothing tending to take the form of grey or brown shooting and riding outfits. The men’s boots were ‘made heavy’ and could be heard clattering on the pavements. To distinguish officers and NCOs, the officers wore on the lapel of their coats a red ribbon and the latter white. Each recruit wore a cardboard badge on the lapel of his coat, bearing the letters UPS in blue.

The Epsom Herald complimented the men as being of average height and good physical proportions. Their wide shoulders, deep chest and full muscles coupled with an intellect allowed them to absorb rapidly their instructor’s tuition but above all they were ‘very nice boys’ who kept within the imposed, five-mile radius of camp.

In February 1916 the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser stated the Leatherhead Institute Committee had confirmed a successful year, even if the meeting itself was not well attended. The committee included the Reverend T.F. Hobson, Septimus Welling, W.A. Maspero and Miss Venthum. The membership in December 1915 had numbered 290, a decrease of twenty-two compared with the preceding year, largely due to the number of members who had joined the Army. The caretaker, Sergeant W. Leadbetter, had left the institute to go to barracks at Chichester.

Badge of the University and Public Schools Brigade.

F Company of 4th Public Schools Battalion, Royal Fusiliers training at Randalls Farm 1914. These postcards were organised and sold by Skelton’s Tobacconist in the High Street.

6th Platoon of the Public Schools Battalion, Royal Fusiliers training in Randalls Farm 1914.

UPS Royal Fusiliers billeted at Woodcote Park, Epsom.

The committee was delighted to extend their facilities, at a small charge, to over 240 new members from the 20th (Service) Battalion, The Royal Fusiliers (UPS). The large hall had been placed at their disposal for lectures and gatherings of a social character. Overall there had been a falling off in the demand for the use of the large hall for entertainments but this was believed to be only temporary and due to the war. The annual entertainments and whist drives in aid of the funds had been discontinued for this season also on account of the war and the receipts had suffered in consequence.

UPS Royal Fusiliers taking a break from training in the countryside surrounding Leatherhead.

Autumn 1914 – Signallers from the 4th UPS Royal Fusiliers outside Ashtead Park.

King George V leaving the parade ground after inspecting the UPS at Ashtead Park.

Signals cable laying team.

UPS Royal Fusiliers marching through Ashtead Park.

UPS Royal Fusiliers parade at Ashtead Common.

The 20th Battalion moved out of Leatherhead to Clipstone Camp near Mansfield, Nottinghamshire in July 1915. In August they moved to Salisbury Plain for further training and firing practice. They proceeded to France in November 1915 but were eventually disbanded on 24 April 1916 with many of the men being commissioned into other battalions.

St John’s School – Commitment and Honour

The Royal Fusiliers UPS who served during the war were not the only public school boys with links to Leatherhead. As with numerous public schools across the empire attitudes at St John’s emphasised Christianity and patriotism, consequently it bred a generation keen to give everything in their service to God and country.

The Officer Training Corps (OTC) at St John’s was started in 1912, under the guidance and leadership of its first commanding officer, schoolmaster and former pupil, Captain Lancelot Townshend Driffield. The newly formed OTC had an eventful first year coping with poor weather, epidemics of mumps and measles and the serious fire of June 1913 in which all their kit was lost.

Towards the end of the war the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser announced that 540 St John’s old boys and sixteen masters had joined the Army and Navy. Of these thirty-two had died in the conflict and thirty-nine returned wounded. There were two Victoria Cross winners: Commander Eric Gascoigne Robinson (HMS Vengeance) and Captain Geoffrey Harold Woolley (Queen Victoria’s Rifles). In addition, there were three Distinguished Service Orders, one Distinguished Service Cross, two Military Crosses, one Cross of St Anne and eleven Mentions in Despatches.

The school also boasted that all its masters, within military age, had attested. Four had been rejected on medical grounds and two injured and consequently discharged and reappointed as masters. Only one master had applied for military exemption from service because he was working at the school to prepare the boys for the Army and Navy in the Army Class.

Second Lieutenant G.H. Woolley of the 9th Battalion of London Regiment (Territorial Force).

An old boy of St John’s, Geoffrey.H. Woolley of the 9th Battalion of London Regiment (Territorial Force) went from St John’s School to Queen’s College, Oxford and received a commission at the beginning of the war. Then a second lieutenant, he was awarded the Victoria Cross ‘for most conspicuous bravery on Hill 60 during the night of 20 April 1915. He was the only officer on the hill and, with a few men, resisted all attacks on their trench. He continued throwing bombs and urged on his men during heavy shelling and machine gun fire.’ Woolley was famed as the first Territorial to win the VC. Another account of the events on that evening stated Woolley picked up an unexploded hand grenade and threw it out of the trench, saving the lives of his fellow soldiers.

Two days later Woolley was promoted directly to captain and saw further action in the early stages of the Second Battle of Ypres until he was invalided back to England suffering from poison gas and its psychological effects. He was appointed as an instructor at the Officers’ Infantry School and returned to the Western Front in the summer of 1916 as a General Staff Officer. Wooley was awarded the Military Cross in the King’s Birthday Honours of 1919 and returned to complete his studies at Oxford. He was ordained in December 1920.

Commander E.G. Robinson served in the Navy from the age of 15 and was known as a daring and resourceful officer. During the Boxer Rebellion in China he was wounded in action and mentioned in despatches. He won his VC during the Gallipoli Campaign of 1915 when he single-handedly destroyed a Turkish naval gun battery under heavy fire. He did not allow members of his demolition party to accompany him as their white uniforms were conspicuous. Retiring as a rear admiral in 1933, he volunteered when the Second World War broke out and commanded Atlantic convoys.

Entertaining the Troops

On New Year’s Eve in 1914 the Leatherhead Institute was gaily decorated, when a smoking concert was held in connection with the Leatherhead Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Queen’s (Royal West Surrey Volunteer Regiment). Smoking concerts were live musical performances before an audience of men only, a relic of the Victorian era. Men would smoke and speak of politics while listening to music. The large audience included members of the regiment from Leatherhead, Ashtead, Cobham and Mickleham, Major H.H. Gordon Clark, the commandant was in the chair. During the evening the opportunity was taken to make presentations to Sergeant Major Coe who had acted as instructor to the company, and whose work on behalf of the company was highly eulogised. Coe was the recipient of a beautiful clock, suitably inscribed and a cheque from the NCOs and men of the Leatherhead Platoon. The Commandant presented a cheque from the officers of the platoon to show their appreciation for his excellent work. Two popular entertainers, Miss Nellie Perryer and Mr Ben Osbourne, together with the regiment’s talented Staff Sergeant Gaskin and Private Pearson took part.

The New Year’s celebrations across Leatherhead witnessed the largest crowds known to the town since September 1914 when the University and Public Schools Battalion had arrived and were billeted throughout the district.

The Kensington Rifles (13th Battalion of the London Regiment) – Four weeks in Leatherhead, March 1915

Within ten days of the declaration of war, the YMCA had established no fewer than 250 recreation centres in the United Kingdom, providing a cup of tea, sandwiches or other refreshments and reading materials. Many of these centres were at or near railway stations or other places where large numbers of troops would be passing. In November 1914, the first YMCA contingent went to France and organised similar centres at Le Havre. Later they were established at Rouen, Boulogne, Dieppe, Étaples and Calais (the principal army bases), Abbeville, Dunkirk, Abancourt (railway junction), Paris and Marseilles. A further 300 centres were added along the lines of communication with the Front. Vast quantities of refreshments were served to troops on the move including one centre at a railway siding at Étaples which served more than 200,000 cups of cocoa each month.

1/13th London Regiment (Kensington Rifles).

The Kensington Rifles (13th Battalion London Regiment.)

The YMCA staff was largely voluntary, mostly female but with some men who were over military age or below the medical requirements for active service. At any one time, some 1,500 YMCA workers were in France and Flanders alone. In June 1915 the YMCA opened a hostel in France for the use of relatives from Britain who were visiting dangerously ill men. A YMCA car met the visitors at the port and took them to see their soldier relative. There were in the region of 100-150 such visitors each day.

Refreshments and entertainment courtesy of the YMCA.

Field guns outside the Old Bull Inn, most likely belonging to (London) Division, Royal Field Artillery, who were in the area in late 1914 and early 1915. The newspapers were forbidden to report on troop movements. Numerous units may well have passed through Leatherhead but without the survival of eye-witness accounts it is difficult to locate the details of these events. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

Soldiers outside the Old Bull Inn, Leatherhead. The five cyclists are probably in the signal section of the London Brigade, Royal Field Artillery. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

Royal Horse Artillery, (London) Division outside the Old Bull Inn, Leatherhead watched by local residents. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

The 1915 Leatherhead Parish Magazine provides evidence of the long forgotten arrival of the Kensington Rifles to Leatherhead. Once again the Leatherhead Institute welcomed the soldiers. Mr Bond, a chaplain with the Kensington Rifles and an organising secretary with the YMCA, was responsible for liaising with the town with regard to setting up a canteen and recreation room at the Institute.

Forty-six local women worked with the YMCA at least part of every day during the battalion’s visit, including Ethel Hunt, the wife of a captain in the Indian Army, Mabel Henderson, the daughter of John Henderson of Randalls Park, and Sybil Woolf of The Priory, Leatherhead. The involvement of these women mirrors the countrywide tendency for those at the higher end of the social spectrum to get involved, especially as these were often women with the private incomes and time to spare.

The Canadians

Once the UPS had left it was decided in 1915 that Woodcote Camp, Epsom would become a convalescent hospital for Imperial troops, mainly from Canada. In June 1915 orderlies were sent to prepare Farm Camp for the first patients and the hospital was ready for opening on 5 September 1915. The Canadian Convalescent Hospital was staffed by the Canadian Army Medical Corps and had 500 beds which soon increased to 1,000 owing to the high level of casualties from Gallipoli.

Not all the patients had received gun or shrapnel wounds as disease was rife in the Army. The patients, who wore the Saxe blue uniform of the convalescent soldier, had been discharged from acute hospitals and stayed for a period of six weeks. Sports were encouraged to get them back into condition, and the patients regularly played baseball (previously unknown in England), as well as cricket and football against the local teams. Every evening entertainments, whether homemade or from London, were provided in the recreation hall in the form of a theatrical performance, a film show, a concert or a lecture. If fit enough, many patients were allowed to visit the surrounding towns including Leatherhead.

By October 1915 some 600 Canadians were also convalescing at the hospital. When the 10th Battalion of the Surrey Volunteers left their Headley training camp they were marched out of the area by Canadian pipers who were on leave from the hospital. The local papers also recorded incidents where local girls, such as May Skilton, a 16-year-old from Dorking had been persuaded to buy alcohol on behalf of the Canadian soldiers on leave; May was fined 5s for her part and warned ‘not to talk to soldiers’ when she was out in town.

Woodcote Park Convalescent Hospital 1916. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

By July 1916 the hospital had grown to over 3,000 patients, with 2,500 in the Canadian section. After the Somme Offensive later that month it became the largest convalescent hospital in the United Kingdom. Six months after the war had ended, some 2,079 patients still remained, desperately awaiting repatriation and demobilisation, many were said to be receiving treatment for ‘certain vile diseases’.

Many local ex-servicemen were equally eager for the Canadians to go home; it was rumoured the local girls found the Canadians more attractive; many were taller given the favourable pre-war diet of Canadian men compared with the generally shorter Tommy. Sadly in June 1919 tensions increased when a fight broke out between the Canadians and local men. Epsom police arrested two of the Canadian soldiers involved and once back at the police station a mob from the Woodcote Hospital arrived to storm the police station and free their colleagues. During the riot Station Sergeant Green died from a severe blow to the head. Five of the Canadians were given five months in prison but no one soldier was charged with Green’s murder. The hospital closed ten days later, on 30 June 1919. It was a very sad end to what had started out as a good relationship between the locals and the Canadians.

Station Sergeant Thomas Green who died 17 June 1919.

Unwelcome strangers

On occasion certain young soldiers passed through Leatherhead whose presence was not welcomed by the residents. James Ollins, a gunner with the Royal Field Artillery, was brought before the Epsom magistrates for obtaining £2 10s by false pretences from Miss Atkins of Kingston Road, Leatherhead. In addition he was accused of wearing the Mons Star and Military Medal ribbons without authority.

The medal was a great honour as recipients had been responsible for assisting the French to hold back the German army while new recruits could be trained and equipped. The battles involved included Mons, the Retreat to the Seine, the battles of Le Cateau, the Marne, the Aisne and the First Battle of Ypres. There were approximately 378,000 Mons Stars issued. Miss Atkins would have been well aware of the significance of the medal.

The Mons Star was authorized by King George V in April 1917 for those who had served in France or Belgium, in the period from 5 August 1914 to midnight on 22 November 1914 inclusive. A bronze clasp sewn onto the ribbon, bearing the dates ‘5th AUG. - 22nd NOV. 1914’ shows the recipient had served under fire of the enemy during that period. For every seven medals issued without a clasp there were approximately five issued with the clasp. Recipients who received the medal with the clasp were also entitled to attach a small silver heraldic rose to the ribbon when just the ribbon was being worn, as was the case with James Ollins. The reverse is plain with the recipient’s service number, rank, name and unit impressed on it.

The investigating officer was Police Sergeant Rose who had discovered the soldier’s real name was James Collins of the 7th Reserve Brigade of the Royal Field Artillery. He had recently enlisted in the Army but was absent from the Borden Camp, Hampshire and appeared never to have been in France. Collins protested his innocence and claimed he had been decorated for his service in the navy and said he could produce a witness from Leatherhead who was in the navy with him. He pleaded guilty but asked for leniency and to be handed back to the military camp in Bordon. In a further twist of events Leatherhead’s Inspector Tudgay, through fingerprint evidence, was able to confirm that Collins was a known criminal with thirteen convictions against him in Ireland; his last sentence was July 1915 when he had served fifteen months’ hard labour. He was send to trial at the Quarter Sessions but the local papers did not report on the outcome.

In early December 1916, Private John Gallagher found himself before E.H. Burgess at the Leatherhead occasional court for being a deserter. Leatherhead’s PC Goody had seen the man working on a threshing machine at Randalls Park Farm. The constable did not recognise Gallagher as a local and at this time, with conscription in full flow, accused Gallagher of being a deserter. In his defence Gallagher said he had been wounded and discharged from the Durham Light Infantry. He claimed to be receiving an army pension of 10s a week but could not provide his discharge papers as they had been stolen, along with £50, when Gallagher had been staying in London.

PC Goody had done his homework and searched the Police Gazette for the listings of deserters. An entry that matched Gallagher’s description dated back to November 1915. At this stage Gallagher admitted to being a deserter and awaited his escort to an army prison for court-martial.

It is not known what happened to Gallagher or why he chose Leatherhead to hide from the authorities. However, he would have known the seriousness of his offence. In total, 5,952 officers and 298,310 other ranks were court-martialled during the war. This amounts to just over three percent of the total of men who joined the Army. Of those tried, 89 per cent were convicted; eight per cent acquitted; the rest were either convicted without the conviction being confirmed or with it being subsequently quashed.

Like Gallagher, of those convicted, 30 per cent were for absence without leave; 15 per cent for drunkenness; 14 per cent for desertion (although like Gallagher only 3 per cent were actually in the field at the time); 11 per cent for insubordination; 11 per cent for loss of army property, and the remaining 19 per cent for various other crimes. The main punishments applied were: three months detention in a military compound – 24 per cent; Field Punishment Number 1 – 22 per cent; Fines – 12 per cent; six months detention – 10 per cent; reduction in rank – 10 per cent; Field Punishment Number 2 – 8 per cent.

Of the 3,080 men sentenced to death by the military courts, 89 per cent were reprieved and the sentence converted to imprisonment with hard labour.

CHAPTER 4

Food Production and Consumption

Food Production and Consumption Time-Line

1914

August

8 Defence of the Realm Act (DORA) passed.

September

18 Trading with the Enemy Act passed imposing severe penalties by way of fine and imprisonment for any person trading with the enemy.

October

8 Proclamation allowing licences for trading with the enemy.

24 Importation of sugar prohibited.

1915

February

4 Germany declares waters round the United Kingdom a war region from 18 February.

7 Foreign Office issues a statement justifying the use of neutral flag for the purpose of evading capture at sea.

First World War Ministry of Food Poster.

March

16 Customs (War Powers) Act allows Customs and Excise officers to confiscate and condemn any goods suspected of being of enemy origin.

June

23 Prime Minister announces forthcoming bill on the registration and organisation of national resources.

1916

January

27 Order in Council on control of shipping and a restriction of imports.

31 War Savings Committee inaugurated.

February

9 Extension of restrictions on sale of sugar.

March

2 System of recruitment exemptions criticised, particularly agriculturalists; women should take the place of men.

17 Food prices had risen 48 per cent.

April

4 A 50-60 per cent increase in taxes on sugar, cocoa and coffee.

July

13 Bank holiday suspended.

November

17 Food regulations issued. The Board of Trade given powers to prevent waste, regulate manufacture and production, direct sale and distribution, control markets, regulate price and commandeer any commodity.

20 Milk and flour regulations issued by Board of Trade.

December

6 The Board of Agriculture is given powers to acquire land.

9 Ministry of Food formed.

1917

January

11 Important food orders issued by Lord Devonport. Millers to increase the amount of flour extracted by additional milling (5 per cent) or add other cereals (up to 10 per cent). The use of wheat except for seed and flour was forbidden. Price of chocolate and other sweetmeats fixed.

31 Germany declares unrestricted naval warfare on all neutral states, within the war zone. German submarines will sink both combatant and neutral shipping at sight from 1 February.

February

2 Lord Devonport appeals to the nation for food economy.

March

5 Potato shortage suggested. Meat consumption in London falls from 31,600 tons in January to 23,450 tons in February.

8 Sir Edward Carson spells out the dangers of food shortages if the German naval threat is not stopped. Further restrictions suggested in response to the 500,000 tons of food sunk in February.

9 Lord Devonport sanctions maximum food prices.

16 Acute potato famine in England.

26 The cost of bread rises to 1s for a 4lb loaf. New standard of flour applied to bakers.

31 Order limiting output of beer in United Kingdom issued.

April

4 Hotels, boarding houses, clubs and restaurants subject to food orders – 1 weekly meatless day, five potato-less days, 5½lb of meat, 3½lbs bread, 14oz flour and ½lb of sugar per person. Amount of non-wheat flour in bread increased.

6 Food hoarding order prohibits anyone from buying, or dealers from selling, more than household needs. Houses can be searched if food hoarding suspected.

13 Board of Trade limits the use of human foodstuff to cattle and horses.

16 Food orders affect the price of wheat, barley and oats.

18 Pastry and cake making restricted.

25 Corn Production Bill to increase the available arable land and guarantee minimum prices and a minimum wage for farmers and labourers.

May

1 Agriculture maintained as a Protected Occupation.

2 Additional Food Orders to extend the power of the Food Controller.

30 Lord Devonport resigns as Food Controller.

July

23 Corn Production Bill Amendment defeated. Minimum agricultural wage raised to 30s a week from 25s, as proposed in the original bill.

September

8 Milk price fixed, at 8d per quart, for three months from October.

17 Ninepenny Loaf Order.

18 New Food Controller Sir A. Yapp appointed.

October

14 Growing shortages of foodstuff.

November

12 New voluntary rations introduced – meat 21b, sugar 8oz, bread 3½ to 8lb, butter and fat 8oz per head per week, depending on occupation and gender.

1918

January

15 Compulsory rationing scheme draft introduced to Control Committees.

23 Public Meals Order.

February

25 Rationing of meat, butter and margarine for London and the Home Counties.

April

7 Meat rationing extended to the whole of Britain.

22 Sugar duty raised.

May

29 Food Production Department report four million acres added for tillage. Estimations suggest 4/5ths of the country’s food homegrown.

July

31 New Director General of Food Production appointed, Sir Charles Fielding.

October

Milk controlled and jam rationed.

The fear of food shortages hung over the nation at the outbreak of war as up to 60 per cent of its food stock came from imports. Panic buying was evident, especially amongst those who could afford to purchase and store food. A letter, by Edgar Frank Hobley, a print manager, to the editor of the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser on 8 August 1914 complained:

‘It appears to be common knowledge that various well-to-do persons in this district have been laying in enormous quantities of food stuffs during the past few days. This is having the effect of raising prices, which will fall most heavily upon the poorest classes. The exhibition of such a selfish spirit at a time of grave national difficulty will not tend to bind all the people together in a common patriotic cause. It is taking a mean advantage, for which no expression of contempt can be too strong. Those traders who have refused to supply exorbitant quantities of commodities deserve public thanks and commendation.’

In some cases food was totally withheld as profiteers tried to push up prices. In October 1916 one Leatherhead resident, Charles Weller said he had not bought any milk since the price had been raised to 6d a quart. He wished everybody else would do the same, as if there was a boycott, the price would soon come down again.

The government did requisition food to keep the prices at a consistent level as it was recognised a loss of agricultural workers into the armed services could have an adverse effect on food production. The initial panic subsided but then re-emerged in December 1916, after which time the Ministry of Food was established to move towards a more formal restriction on consumption, aimed at preventing profiteering and hoarding.

Charles Weller (far right), a printing compositor, with his family in 1913. The family lived at 3 Flint Cottages, Church Walk, Leatherhead.

Early in the war the government assured the nation of the Royal Navy’s ability to protect incoming vital supplies. There was however concern as the majority of Britain’s sugar supplies came from countries now considered the enemy, plus there had been poor harvests and transportation issues surrounding the shipment of wheat from Russia. Meat supplies were also in question owing to the increasing demands of a growing army.

By the spring of 1917 the Ministry of Food became aware of a growing and potentially bigger threat as German U-boats sank approximately 300,000 tons of shipping in April alone. Germany intended to starve Britain into surrender. To promote ‘economy’ the nation was informed it was illegal to consume more than two courses whilst lunching in a public eating place, or more than three for dinner, plus fines were introduced for members of the public found feeding the pigeons or stray animals.

The Running Horse in Bridge Street. After the spring of 1917 the public were no longer permitted to consume more than two courses in one sitting.

Exports of food were prohibited and numerous committees and commissions were tasked with keeping prices down and securing supplies. The War Savings Committee played its part and tried to establish the ‘Eat Less Meat’ days in 1916, leading to a greater reliance on fish, in turn inflating the price of fish.

The Surrey Mirror of 2 November 1917 carried an illustration as part of an advertisement, on behalf of International Stores, suggesting, ‘during the next few months there may be a shortage of tea. It is one of the little inconveniences we must suffer on account of the war, but the difficulty can be overcome by drinking coffee instead of tea.’

Government poster encouraging a lower consumption of bread.

Illustration promoting coffee as an alternative to tea.

Compulsory rationing was introduced in stages between December 1917 and February 1918. Britain’s supply of wheat had decreased to just six weeks’ worth of supplies. Ration books were introduced on 15 July 1918 for butter, margarine, lard, meat, and sugar. Regardless of these shortages the average calorie intake decreased by only 3 per cent, but protein intake by 6 per cent, throughout the war. Prices for most commodities grew by an average of 50 per cent over the course of the war, but for fresh meat it was 100 per cent, fish by nearly 200 per cent and, highest of all, eggs by a staggering 400 per cent.

Despite initial worries some businesses gained substantially if they were able to secure one of the army contracts. The advertisements for government contracts were run in local papers. Sealed tenders were invited for the baking of bread for a period of three months from 1 March 1915 to 31 May 1915. Forms to apply were obtained from the Assistant Director of Supplies and Transport, London District, Horse Guards, SW Headquarters Office.

School children and food supplies

In May 1915 the Secretary to the Surrey Education Committee was concerned about the increasing use of children in the agricultural industry. Despite the war, the committee was not prepared to agree to any general relaxation of the bye-laws. They were however, willing to consider on their merits, any special cases.

The Elementary Education Act of 1876 did permit children to work on farms if there was a special emergency, where no other labour was available, but children could not be excused from school if older children were available. Any farm that did use children had to demonstrate it had made every effort to secure adult labour at a fair rate of pay. In the event of an emergency the temporary work should be of ‘a light character and suitable to the capacity of the child’. Girls were especially not permitted to enter into domestic service rather than attend school. Each town applied the regulations according to their own judgement; it was widely rumoured that boys in Guildford over the age of twelve had been given leave from school to work on farms. The fact the authorities needed to reinforce the legislation suggests the rules were being broken.

Allotments

Compared to 1914 wheat prices had risen by a staggering 72 per cent by the spring of 1915. In response the Leatherhead Urban Council decided to plough up a three-acre, central portion of the Forty Foot Road Recreation Ground and turn it over to wheat growing. The decision was controversial as many residents thought it totally unnecessary. Over time the decision was proven to be a wise one as newspapers were proud to declare ‘36 sacks of very fine wheat’ had been produced after the harvest of 1915. Their success had meant an excellent profit, as the price of wheat was relatively high, as well as a provision of straw for the winter months.

The effect of price rises varied from family to family. Those whose income relied on the buying and selling of foodstuffs were able to see an improvement in their standard of living whilst those on a fixed wage suffered the greatest; the government statistics had shown around 20 per cent of an average working class family’s income was spent on primary necessities such as wheat and meat. Worst affected were the families with only one wage earner on a fixed income who supported a number of young children.

The good weather was an important factor in maintaining food supplies. Newspapers in April 1917 said Easter at Leatherhead was the quietest known for many years, the traffic through the town being infinitesimal compared with former holidays, while the visitors were extremely few. The weather on Good Friday was wintry and on Easter Monday a cold wind blew all day, accompanied with frequent heavy falls of snow and sleet. Bad weather hindered those working in their gardens or allotments and consequently meant poorer crops.

Land, such as recreation grounds, became allotments in response to the fear of food shortages. Leatherhead’s Forty Foot Road Recreation Grounds were used to grow wheat and still had space left for drill practice.

In order to maintain food supplies the local council encouraged schemes such as the potato trials of October 1916. These trials proved yields from Scottish or Irish potatoes would produce double the results of home grown seeds. The council also worked in conjunction with the Board of Agriculture to manage what they called ‘war plots’ or allotments. At the launch of the war plots they enjoyed 120 members and held regular public meetings to discuss their progress and share ideas. They had also decided to become members of the National Association of Allotment Holders. Leatherhead seed merchants Hewlin donated seeds to the scheme and Hutchinsons, Moulds and Blaker Bros. donated tools. In response the allotment growers were encouraged to purchase any other supplies locally, reported the Surrey Mirror in April 1918.

The local magistrates court was regularly dealing with businesses it felt were profiteering. At the Epsom Petty Sessions on 26 April 1918, before the Chairman, Mr. B Braithwaite, Margaret Davis of 61 Dene Street, Dorking was summoned for selling to Charles Pettitt Cavell 1lb of herrings at a price exceeding that authorised by the Fish Prices Order. In relation to the same case Alfred Norris Marshall, High Street, Epsom was summoned for aiding and abetting.

Mr Lickfold, on behalf of the Epsom Food Control Committee, said the price of fresh herrings was 8d a pound and the price of smoked or cured herrings was 10d a pound. Mr Marshall claimed he had put some salt on the fish, which would technically make them cured and worth 10d a pound. Mrs Davis complained that at 8d they could not make a profit. The court made further enquiries and discovered Mr Marshall had purchased boxes of herrings at £4 5s per box of 134lbs. The cost to him was 7.6d per pound so selling at 8d a pound and would give him a profit of 5 per cent on his outlay, but by selling at 10d per pound he was getting a profit of 23 per cent. The case was dismissed but Mr Marshall was not awarded costs.

As the war dragged on into 1918 the Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, sent a message to the agricultural labourers across the country. He asked all workers on the land to do their very utmost to help grow more food. There was a shortage of food across the world which came at a time they needed to feed the Army, Navy and everyone at home. The servicemen relied on being properly fed. In effect, by working harder, agricultural workers had it in their remit to shorten the war and bring peace and victory nearer. His plea finished with the words:

‘Your comrades in the trenches are under fire every hour of the day and night. Will you not help them to win by working an extra hour each day? That is the way in which you can beat the Germans.’

Women on the Land in Surrey

In October 1917 a report from the Secretary of the Surrey Women’s Agricultural Committee stated that the village registrars had recorded 860 women working full time, 994 part time and 261 who were willing to work but not yet employed, on the land in Surrey. There were in addition 180 National Service recruits which would bring the total to well over 1,000. The Board of Agriculture had already been given the power to requisition land and replace inefficient farmers with prisoners of war or conscientious objectors. As women had increasingly proved themselves as a growing workforce, and regardless of early criticism, the government decided to create the Women’s Land Army, complete with uniforms. By July 1918 the Board of Agriculture estimated there were 113,000 land girls working in Britain. In Leatherhead on 23 November 1918 the land girls in the local area joined the town’s procession to celebrate the signing of the Armistice. Their uniform was free and consisted of a smock, breeches, boots, leggings, jersey, mackintosh and a hat. Her pay was 18s or more a week, whereas before the war a male agricultural worker got 14s. The girls spent six weeks training at an agricultural centre or farm before being posted.

Emma Jolly was born in 1895 and served with the Women’s Land Army from 1917. She trained at Highcroft in Hertfordshire and was posted to Arkley Rise Estate. (John Oldman, Emma’s nephew)

Leatherhead’s National Kitchen

Ministers in Lloyd George’s government agonised over the best way of combating hunger when Germany’s U-boats disrupted Britain’s food supply. The government was keen to avoid the stigma of poverty associated with soup kitchens and wanted to utilise the volunteer-run community kitchens springing up in working class communities to help deal with food shortages. A network of public cafeterias was seen as the answer. The cafeterias were known as National Kitchens and offered a mass-catering initiative to provide affordable and nutritious meals.

In May 1917 these public canteens were set up across the country and Leatherhead was no exception. A bowl of soup, a portion of meat and vegetables cost 6d – just over £1 in today’s money. Puddings, scones and cakes could be bought for as little as 1d (about 18p). These self-service restaurants, run by local workers and partly funded by government grants, offered simple meals at subsidised prices. The Ministry of Food insisted that the kitchens should feel like places where ‘ordinary people in ordinary circumstances’ could sit down together at long canteen tables for a cheap meal.

Leatherhead’s National Kitchen was organised and opened in the autumn of 1917 under the leadership of Constance Ethel Chapman who reported back to the Leatherhead Food Control Committee. Mrs Chapman was the wife of a seed broker living at Kinawley, Station Road, Leatherhead. The family had lived in France, Constance’s eldest son, Willoughby George Chapman, and husband had both been born in France, which may account for Constance’s tireless work to help the war effort.

The first National Kitchen at 104 Westminster Bridge Road, opened by Queen Mary on 21 May 1917.

From its opening day it was well supported and there was enough food to meet demand. The kitchen opened between noon and 1.45 pm with orders being placed in advance and kept warm for their arrival. Initially there were difficulties in acquiring suitable premises, but the large hall adjoining the Unionist Club, Linden Road was eventually secured and fitted up with the latest ‘up-to-date lines’. As early as 7am the day’s work began and the doors were opened to the public at 11.30am. On opening day the chief item on the menu was 620 portions roast beef. There was a queue at the door and within an hour all 620 portions had been eaten. There were also sweets and vegetables and by 1pm the provisions were sold out. The kitchen was to open every day except Sundays and the menu was displayed in advance throughout the town. The food was purchased at wholesale rates and the charges covered the costs, as the aim was not to make a profit. Overall the Leatherhead kitchen achieved its aim of providing nourishing food and saving fuel consumption.

One concern for the organisers was the lack of support from the ‘poorer classes’ but those few that did venture into the hall were offered a large cup of tea for a penny. To address the problem Mrs Chapman suggested taking the food to the poorer Kingston Road area of town, especially during the winter months.

Overall great efforts were made to make sure the Leatherhead kitchen was an attractive place to eat and that it was run along business lines rather than feeling it was a charitable handout. This was possibly the first time Leatherhead’s middle-class professionals sat alongside working class families; a pattern that was mirrored in the relationships between soldiers and officers in the trenches.

At the height of their popularity in 1918, 363 National Kitchens were doing business across the country. Wartime civil servants at the Ministry of Food eagerly discussed whether they might become a permanent national institution, but the experiment was not to last. The restaurant trade was not happy at the threat to private enterprise. The introduction of full rationing toward the end of the war apportioned food to each individual, damping demand for communal eating. And after the war ended, local authorities were reluctant to help fund kitchens any longer. Within six months of Armistice Day, 120 of the kitchens had closed.

Education and nutrition

Local papers were in a position to educate the people on the efficient purchase and preparation of food. The greater the amount of wastage by the British public, it was argued at the time, the higher the chance that Britain would lose the war. The object of these short articles was to teach in plain words what food was made of and how it was used in the body. The papers made no apology for taking an often patronising tone because of the lack of apparent understanding of nutrition by the general population. This is from the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertizer of 24 February 1917:

‘Scraps which in an ordinary household have in the past been thrown away will be utilised in the making of soups. Much can also be accomplished by a more intelligent use of vegetables and in the preparation of drinks. Cooking is a many-sided art and calls for the exercise of aptitude of taste’.

The butchers in North Street, Leatherhead before the war when meat supply was abundant.

A 1918 Food ration card.

In July 1915 the Purley Poultry Farm advertised their stock to Leatherhead residents. They stated, ‘the day is coming when eggs and poultry will be almost worth their weight in gold. It will pay you to take the advice given by the Press and start keeping a few fowls. We can supply a complete outfit: a pretty, well-made house, birds of the best laying strains, foods, brooders etc. at a small inclusive price.’

The advertisement ended by comforting the reader that the farm was only ‘a pleasant quarter of an hour’s walk from Purley Tram Terminus’; one wonders how pleasant the walk back to the tram was with a few fowls tucked under each arm?

Eventually the government was forced to introduce rationing in 1918. The Government Food Controller made allowances for 2½lbs of meat per head, per week. Porridge was encouraged for breakfast to save bread or flour, potato with meat at dinner and the use of rice pudding. Oatmeal, potato and rice were recommended as a replacement for bread.

Blackberries Wanted

In 1918 when food rationing was introduced the Leatherhead Food Control Committee was set up to look at the ways of utilising any available natural resource. Rural schools throughout the country were instructed to ‘employ their children in gathering blackberries during school hours for the Government jam making scheme.’ The local papers announced on 17 August 1918 that the blackberry crop in the Leatherhead district should be gathered and sent to the jam factories for preserving. There was a financial incentive for the children as the committee offered the rate of 3d per pound for blackberries brought to the local Food Office, Church Street, between the hours of 5 and 7 in the evening. This would have been great fun for the children but meant less time for academic pursuits.

The fruit was packed into specially provided baskets of a regulation size and sent immediately by rail to the special factories where it was made into blackberry and apple jam for members of HM Forces. Payment shared out among the gatherers, was usually a good sum of money when compared to the average weekly wage of an agricultural worker, in 1918, who was paid just £1.10.6d for a 52-hour week. The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser reported the upper classes of the Council School under the guidance of their headmaster E.H. Burgess had taken an afternoon off school to cover as far out as Bookham, Fetcham, Headley and High Ashurst. The Food Committee announced the receipt of 3cwt of blackberries.

The school children were also given wartime cookery classes by the ladies of Leatherhead, including Miss Sharpe and Mrs Allen. The older children were asked to cook a dinner for two people, while the younger ones cooked vegetables. The food cooked was then entered into a competition and judged to be of a very high standard. It was hoped the children would take home their new-found knowledge to help educate their parents.

Edwin Burgess, master of the Boys’ National School in Highlands Road 1887–1913 and headmaster of the Upper Mixed School 1913–1923, in charge of the blackberry picking in August 1918.

CHAPTER 5

Business as Usual at Work and Home?

‘Business as usual’ was a policy instigated by the British Government, under Prime Minister H.H. Asquith at the beginning of the war. Its premise was the belief that in order to keep the country functioning and stable, it was necessary to keep society operating in the same way as it did before the war. If society changed it was believed the enemy had won.

In the summer of 1914 the war was expected to have a serious effect upon various aspects of the economy. To tackle the anticipated problems relief committees were set up across the country. With local men leaving for the Front, there was concern for the families they left behind, especially as state provision did not arrive until late 1915. The Leatherhead Commercial Association Hon. Secretary was local solicitor Bernard Stenning. It had been Stenning’s role before the war to represent Leatherhead’s interests at the Royal Counties Shows and similar events. The Commercial Association’s initial reaction was to take out an advertisement in August 1914 to encourage support for local companies. Thankfully the problems of unemployment and financial distress did not materialise to any large scale during the war.

National War Savings Committee Poster, 1915.

London Boot Supply in North Street Leatherhead – Children’s shoe sales increased during the war – a sure sign the economy was relatively healthy.

Rumours of bank note forgeries would often persist throughout the country, unnecessarily worrying traders. It was the role of the Press Bureau to inform the public of the truth behind such rumours. In October 1915 an article entitled NO FORGED CURRENCY NOTES claimed there were no forged currency notes bearing certain specified numbers. The statement, reported in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser in October 1915, asserted it had come from enemy sources with a view to shaking public confidence.

Local residents were encouraged to purchase their supplies locally. (DLA 22 August 1914)

Advertisement for the Prudential Assurance Company.

Frank Arnold – The Leatherhead Life Assurance Superintendent

Surviving the war could depend on a man’s occupation and his perceived necessity to the home front. Frank Arnold was married to Jessie, and in 1914 they had two daughters, Gladys (14) and Agnes (5); the 1911 Census shows Jessie had given birth to three children but only two had survived. The census also shows Frank working as an Assistant Superintendent for the Prudential Assurance Company and living at Lime View, Copthorne Road, Leatherhead.

At the turn of the century the Prudential had become the leading UK life company, with £30 million in accumulated funds. The company grew rapidly and by the end of the war the company had paid out claims on more than one third of the British soldiers killed during the war.

In November 1916 Frank was conscripted into the 1st Battalion, Royal Fusiliers as Private 42530. By this time, given his work in the life assurance business and the enormous losses on the Somme and the Ypres Salient, Frank would have been well aware of the perils he faced and yet his notice in the papers indicates he was going to make every effort to look after his customers whilst away. It is likely Jessie, his wife, assisted customers in his absence. Frank had not wanted to serve in the Army. An article headed ‘Result of Appeals’ in the 8 July 1916 informed locals that his appeal had been rejected by the Surrey Appeals Tribunal at Guildford with a simple few words – ‘Frank Arnold (38), insurance inspector, Leatherhead, dismissed’. Frank’s fate was sealed; he was never to return to his civilian career. His name is listed on the Arras Memorial as he died on the battlefield on 14 April 1917 and his body was never recovered.

Frank Arnold’s newspaper advertisement on 28 October 1916 in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser.

For some Leatherhead organisations the war made business as usual exceptionally difficult. The Royal School for the Blind continued to operate throughout the war regardless of the Volunteer Training Corps regular drill practice on their premises. They did however restrict their visiting times to the first Tuesday of the month from 3 to 5pm, instead of every Tuesday afternoon. The average age of the firemen in Leatherhead grew, as younger men, such as Skelton and Worsfold, left to fight and older men such as William Boorer, a plumber living in Church Walk, replaced them.

The firemen head off to war. (DLA 26 September 1914)

Fireman ‘Smoking Harris’. His role with the fire brigade was kept open whilst he was away fighting.

Personnel problems in Leatherhead’s fire brigade as men left to join the services.

The employment of able-bodied men, capable of fighting at the front, was seen as unpatriotic. Employers went to great lengths to make sure only the young and old would apply.

Venthams – From Coaches and Cars to Shells and Tanks

Charles Ventham, the founder of the Ventham Coachbuilders of Leatherhead, appears on the 1851 Census as coach painter living at 8 Bridge Street. In 1861 Charles and his two sons were listed as coachbuilders and were successful enough to employ an additional three men. The family business survived the competition from rail travel because it was able to become part of the coaching revival in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. At the beginning of the twentieth century the company had evolved to accommodate the new age of the motor car by offering motor body work, repairs plus a wide range of general engineering, from electric lighting to telephones. Venthams survived the war and continued till 1936 when Edward Ventham, grandson of Charles, closed the business and retired to Bognor Regis.

The Shell Crisis of 1915 was due to a shortage of artillery shells on the front lines that led to a political crisis in Britain. The start of the war had seen a change in military tactics. Instead of the use of artillery in support for infantry attacks, heavy guns alone would control the battlefield. Unfortunately by 1915 the high rate of fire lasting over a long period of time had not been anticipated and the stocks became worryingly low. The press was quick to openly criticize the government and directly led to the creation of a coalition government with Lloyd George as Minister of Munitions; the responsibility for munitions was taken away from Kitchener.

Ventham the Coachbuilders, Bridge Street, in 1895. The company switched to munitions and tank gear manufacture during the war.

A Ventham car in Leatherhead in the 1930s. Edward Ventham is possibly the gentleman in the bowler hat.

Following the creation of the Ministry of Munitions, new factories began to be built across the country for the mass production of munitions. The construction of these factories took time and, in order to ensure that there was no delay in the production of munitions to deal with the Shell Crisis, the government turned to railway companies to manufacture materials of war. It is most likely at this time that Venthams became involved in the manufacture of munitions.

The Munitions of War Act 1915 prevented the resignation of munitions workers without their employer’s consent but this did not stop Ventham employees coming before the Military Tribunals once conscription was introduced in 1916. In time Venthams would get involved with the production of gear mechanisms for the use in tanks.

Tanks, or landships as they were first known, were developed for the first time by the British Army during the war, born of the need to break the static domination of trenches, barbed wire and machine guns. The name ‘tank’ was chosen to disguise its purpose, derived from a deliberately misleading association with water tanks. Very little is written in the local papers about the munitions and tank equipment manufactured at Venthams but this is most likely due to the level of secrecy required by the government and fear of aerial bomb attacks.

The armoured tracked vehicle was developed to cross trenches, resist small-arms fire, travel over difficult terrain, carry supplies, and to capture fortified enemy positions. It was regarded as successful in many respects, but suffered from many problems owing to its primitive nature. The first tanks entered service in August 1916 and forty-nine were deployed on 15 September in the Battle of Flers-Courcelette, part of the Somme Offensive. Steering was especially difficult, controlled by varying the speed of the two tracks. There were two drivers, one for the brakes and the other for the primary gearbox and two ‘gearsmen’ to control direction and speed. Many of these vehicles broke down in the heat of battle making them an easy target for German gunners. There was no wireless so communication was by carrier pigeon.

The bright light of Dr Marie Stopes

The 1911 Census shows the family of Arthur Tom Hicks, an insurance adjuster, living at a house called Craig Vara, in Belmont Road, Leatherhead. At some point between March 1911 and 1913, the Hicks family left and Dr Marie Stopes (1880–1958) moved into Craig Vara and made it her home. Later Marie was to reside locally at Givon’s Grove and Norbury Park Farm.

During the war, Stopes was engaged in studies of coal for the British Government, which culminated in the writing of Monograph on the constitution of coal, published in 1918. Alongside her academic work Marie was interested in politics and supported women’s suffrage, joining the Women’s Freedom League. Her views clashed with the more traditional views of her first husband Reginald Ruggles Gates. The couple had married on 18 May 1911 and two days later Gates had left for St Louis, USA on the Lusitania, to carry on his work as a botanist. Gates divided his working life between Britain and the US but his marriage to Marie was annulled in 1916 for non-consummation.

Marie Stopes 1905.

Home of Marie Stopes – Craig Vara, Belmont Road, Leatherhead.

Around the start of her divorce proceedings in 1913 and whilst living in Leatherhead, Stopes began to write a book about the way she thought marriage should work. In July 1915, she met Margaret Sanger, who had just given a talk on birth control at a Fabian Society meeting. Stopes showed Sanger her writings and sought her advice about a chapter on contraception. Stopes’s book was finished by the end of 1913 but Walter Blackie of Blackie & Son rejected the manuscript on the grounds of the subject matter and flippantly added: ‘Don’t you think you should wait publication until after the war? There will be few enough men for the girls to marry and a book like this would frighten off the few.’

Several other publishers refused the book because they thought it too controversial. When in 1917 Binnie Dunlop, secretary of the Malthusian League, introduced her to Humphrey Verdon Roe, who was to become Stopes’s second husband, she received the boost that helped her publish her book. The book was an instant success, requiring five editions in the first year, and elevated Stopes to national prominence.

Cover of Married Love by Marie Stopes written whilst Stopes was living in Leatherhead.

Married Love was published on 26 March 1918, the same day Stopes was visiting Humphrey Roe, who had just returned with a broken ankle from service during the war after his aeroplane crashed. Less than two months later they were married and Stopes had her first opportunity to practise what she preached in her book. Together they worked tirelessly to keep the clinic running and expand their operations to other cities in Britain. Marie eventually left Leatherhead claiming she needed ‘intelligent youth, Leatherhead being too grown up for her’. She and Roe separated in 1938, at which time she moved into Norbury Park.

Dr Marie Stopes.

On 3 April 1918, shortly before her marriage to Humphrey Verdon Roe, Marie appeared before Epsom Petty Sessions magistrates for failing to ‘shade or reduce an inside light’ at Craig Vara in Belmont Road on 11 March 1918. PC Lewis alleged at 12.05am he was patrolling in Bridge Street when he saw a bright light coming from the defendant’s house. Having called at the house PC Lewis was informed ‘an old gentleman who was staying in the house must have gone downstairs and come back without turning off the light.’ Marie was fined 15 shillings. After the war she found herself before the magistrates again, this time for failing to keep her black Chow dog under proper control.

Stopes’s contravention of Leatherhead’s black-out regulations was taken very seriously by the authorities because the light attracted the attention of enemy bombers. During the war the German air force carried out 103 aerial bombing raids over Great Britain. The main targets were industrial cities, army camps and munitions factories. At first Germany used Zeppelins to bomb Britain. However, these were fairly easy to shoot down so in June 1917 Germany began sending the long-range bomber, the Gotha G-V, to Britain. The Gotha, with its giant wingspan of 24 metres, was easy to identify and at first created considerable panic in those towns under attack. In the first raid over Folkestone, the Gotha bombing raid killed 95 people and wounded 195 more. This raid caused more casualties than any of the Zeppelin attacks that had taken place in the early stages of the war.

Marie Stopes was not the only doctor to be prosecuted locally. Dr Cornish was summonsed for using headlights on his motor car in contravention of the Defence of the Realm Act. Dr Cornish was seen by PC Hopkins at 10.40pm in Leatherhead High Street with his headlights on. In his defence Cornish insisted they were not bright lights but sidelights, insisted that the law was ‘extremely foolish’, and claimed he was a ‘conscientious objector to taking life’. His plea gained no sympathy; he was fined £1 and ordered to drive slower. These news reports served to remind locals of the wartime regulations and the penalties for breaking the rules; it was not long before the paper sub-headlines were regularly entitled MORE HEADLIGHT CASES.

Celebrations and mourning – The Petersen Family

For members of the upper classes the war had a major impact on their privileged lives. Conscription had led to shortages in the domestic labour needed to maintain their large stately homes. The Petersen family were living at Cherkley Court and maintained a home at Hyde Park. There were also shortages in fuel; in 1917 Lady Cynthia Asquith wrote in her diary, ‘the phenomenal cold still worse than ever. We all shivered ... but got through the evening very well with the help of silly round games.’

Illustrated London News 14 April 1915 – the wedding announcement of Doris Petersen.

The next morning Lady Asquith breakfasted in her fur coat and sympathised with her hostess’s attempts to cope with the rationing of basic foodstuffs.

The financial decline of Britain’s aristocracy was in sharp contrast to what they had enjoyed during the pre-war years, when their pleasures included house parties, the copious consumption of alcohol, dancing, gambling and flirtations, and sports including hunting and shooting. As stately homes became military hospitals and convalescent homes, family members dutifully stepped forward to treat injured men evacuated from the Front.

Regardless of the changes in lifestyle the war had instigated, nothing could compare with the loss of loved ones and the effect on the family. The ‘County Jottings’ section in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of 10 April 1915 reported the marriage of Doris Petersen and Major Douglas Reynolds in St Joseph’s Church, Epsom. The ceremony was a very quiet one, as the bride’s family was in mourning for Second Lieutenant William Sinclair Petersen, her brother, a Life Guard killed in action on 6 November 1914. The papers reported that the Petersens, a wealthy Danish ship-owning family, were residing at Hyde Park and Cherkley Court, Leatherhead.

The Petersens of Cherkley Court would have suffered immeasurably at this time, not only for the loss of their son, but because the bodies of those who fell in action or died of wounds overseas were buried close to where they fell. In many cases these cemeteries were on ground which was later fought over or subjected to artillery fire and grave sites were lost, hence the memorials to the missing which were later built such as Thiepval on the Somme and the Menin Gate in Ypres. Such a situation flew in the face of expected traditions of mourning.

William Petersen was buried in Zillebeke in what became known as the ‘Aristocrats Graveyard’ because of the number of public school educated officers of the British Army of 1914 buried there.

The bridegroom, Major Douglas Reynolds of the Royal Field Artillery, was one of the first officers to be awarded the Victoria Cross on 26 August 1914. He won the decoration at Le Cateau, for conspicuous bravery, when he manoeuvred two teams of horses and limbered up two guns under heavy artillery and infantry fire, and, though the enemy was within a hundred yards, he got one gun away safely. Major Reynolds returned to the battlefields shortly after the wedding. He died of wounds ten months later on 23 February 1916.

Major Douglas Reynolds VC.

Second Lieutenant William Sinclair Petersen.

The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser published on 12 February 1916 adds a further twist to the tale of the Petersen family. It reported ‘a marriage is arranged, and will shortly take place between Captain Alastair George Lionel Miller, Irish Guards, attached to the Royal Flying Corps, only surviving son of Sir William F. Miller, Bart., and Lady Miller of Glenlee and Flora, youngest daughter of Mr and Mrs William Petersen, Cherkley Court, Leatherhead.’ However that marriage never took place. With the death of her sister’s husband, Douglas Reynolds, the timing of the celebrations may have been simply too much for the family to endure. Miller would marry three times and divorce three times. He was jailed in the 1950s for indecent assault.

Instead Flora married Lieutenant Colonel W.M. Duguid-McCombie in November 1918 but reports in The Sketch state the family were in mourning again as Flora’s mother had drowned in her bath in June 1918.

Lieutenant Colonel W.M. Duguid-McCombie.

An article published in The Sketch of 20 November 1918 read:

‘The recent wedding of Lieutenant Colonel W.M. Duguid McCombie, Royal Scots Greys, of Easter Skene and Lynturk, Aberdeenshire, to Miss Flora Petersen, youngest daughter of Mr William Petersen, and the late Mrs William Petersen, of 80, Portland Place, and Eigg, Inverness-shire, drew a large congregation to the Oratory, Brompton, although the wedding was a very quiet one, owing to mourning in the family of the bride, who was given away by her father. There were two bridesmaids – Lady Doreen Browne and the Hon. Lettice Digby, who wore pale heliotrope chiffon and there was a little page, Master Peter Douglas Reynolds, son of the late Major Douglas Reynolds VC; and Captain Eric Bonham, Scots Greys, was best man. The bride wore a long tulle veil which formed a train, and a wreath of orange-blossoms. Prince and Princess Arthur of Connaught, whose engagements prevented their presence at the Oratory, sent a wedding gift to the bride.’

Wedding Announcement in The Sketch, 20 November 1918.

Sadly Flora died on 6 January 1920. Her obituaries noted her war work.

Following Queen Victoria’s example, in 1914 it was still customary for families to go through elaborate mourning rituals to commemorate their dead. Mourning clothes would be worn, a lavish and expensive funeral would be held, social behaviour would be curtailed for a set period of time. Mourning clothes were a family’s outward display of their inner feelings. The rules for who wore what and for how long were complicated, and were outlined in popular journals or household manuals such as Cassell’s Household Guide.

For deepest mourning, clothes were to be black, symbolic of spiritual darkness. The colour of cloth lightened as mourning went on, to grey, mauve, and white, known as half-mourning. A widow might remarry but it was important to give the appearance that a new emotional life was far from her thoughts. However, during the war attempts to demonstrate lasting respect became increasingly difficult given the context of such mass bereavement. As the war progressed mourning dress was less widely worn. Endless black mourning was seen as lowering the morale of the troops who came home on leave. Severe fabric shortages would make it expensive to acquire a new dark wardrobe. Purple armbands were worn as alternatives, although the older generations continued to wear black in and out of mourning. Black clothing evolved to the point where it represented elegance.

It was not only in aristocratic circles that society was evolving beyond recognition. Before the end of the war it was recognised that the country had changed, it was not ‘business as usual’ and all levels of society would never be the same again. Three years into the conflict, an editorial was published to highlight ‘after-war problems’. The article was clear to assert ‘our changed outlook in many directions’. Most of all for the men fighting at the Front, when they returned, were expected to demand ‘great changes’ for the social well-being of the nation in the future. The low pay for teachers was the first criticism; education for boys and girls, it was argued, should afford to attract the best brains in the country. Attention should also be demanded to establish proper Maternity and Child Welfare Centres – and this was just the start of their expectations.

Brenda (nee Petersen) Countess of Wilton and twin sister to Doris, in a black dress worn to emphasis her sophistication rather than mourning. Brenda served during the war. (Manchester Art Gallery)

CHAPTER 6

Unwelcome Residents

Fuelling Xenophobia

The Alien Registration Act and British Nationality Act of 1914 required all foreigners over 16 to register at local police stations and to demonstrate a good character and knowledge of English. This was partly due to a fear of spies.

Sir John French gave an account to the British public in October 1914 of the fighting on the Marne and the Aisne but warned the public would be kept in ignorance of the real conditions at the Front because of ‘the pitch to which the Germans have brought their systems of spies’. He blamed the ‘aliens in our midst’ as spies which always exist wherever nations are at war:

‘In the Front the commanders know how to deal with them when caught, but at home we are more lenient than seems altogether compatible with the safety of the men who are enduring the hardships of warfare for the preservation of the nations.’

Some British residents felt it their patriotic duty to treat the ‘alien in our midst’ without leniency. The newspapers filled their columns with news of ‘spies’ and their capture.

Anti-German Union Poster.

The Swan Hotel in Leatherhead would have been fully aware of its obligation to register alien guests.

Headed SPY PERIL CASES IN LONDON the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of November 1914 reported that George Wackenheim, a 19-year-old German waiter, was charged with failing to register himself as an alien enemy. Louis Garin (58), a hotel manager in Piccadilly, was charged with knowingly employing Wackenheim, an unregistered German. Wackenheim had allegedly told Garin he was a Frenchman, having been born in Alsace Lorraine. The penalties were relatively harsh: Wackenheim was expected to find sureties of £20 before coming up for judgement and Garin, who had employed him without enquiries, was fined £5 or one month imprisonment. It was likely Wackenheim knew being German made him unemployable and had no intention of spying.

The first year of the war was a time of rumour piled upon rumour, which the authorities publicly tried to quell. A Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser article in July 1915 insisted there had been no increase in London fires. The Home Office stated clearly it is not true that ‘the number and gravity of fires in London has been above average; there was no grounds for suspecting an enemy alien origin in those reported, and that no armoured cars were destroyed in the recent fire at Park Royal.’

Trading with the enemy

The land war certainly contributed to the Entente’s victory in 1918 but it was the Royal Navy’s blockade of German ports that truly broke Germany. Potentially the war could have gone on even longer, but the world’s pre-eminent land force was left with no other choice than to surrender as the seeds of revolution brewed among its population. British spies and other ground assets were essential to keep the blockade running at peak efficiency. Each individual was tasked with finding which merchants were transporting contraband to the enemy and the routes they would be taking, to enable interception.

Prior to the First World War, Germany was one of the primary trading partners for British companies. Parliament tried to address this issue early in 1914 with the Trading with the Enemy Act, but in some instances the government had permitted limited trade if it served British interests. In the first nine months of the war over ninety cases were tried for continuing commerce with Germany or any of the territories it occupied. These cases ranged from minor offences such as Phillips & Company’s attempts to import bicycle handles from Germany, leading to a £500 fine, to an iron firm by the name of Jack & Co. for sending some 7,359 tons of iron ore to Germany. The vast majority of British merchants sacrificed pre-war business networks for the sake of the war effort and furthermore the British public stopped buying from German traders such as bakers and butchers.

Even between well-established companies, accusations flowed, demonstrated by the very public legal actions of Lyons v Lipton when Mr Justice Sankey granted an interim injunction on behalf of Messrs J. Lyons and Co Ltd to restrain, ‘Messrs. Lipton Ltd., their servants or agents, from speaking or writing or publishing any words to the effect or of the substance that J. Lyons and Co Ltd or the directorate thereof, is composed of Germans and that by purchasing their commodities the public is assisting the enemies of Great Britain.’

Lyons began as a collaboration between the professional artist Joseph Nathaniel Lyons and his brothers-in-law, Isidore and Montague Gluckstein; the German name set off alarm bells to those eager to rid the nation of any perceived ‘Germanic’ influence. The company had begun a teashop in Piccadilly and from 1909 developed this into a chain of teashops known as Lyon’s Corner Houses. The company also ran high-class restaurants, founding the Trocadero in 1895, and hotels including the Strand Palace, opened in 1909, and the Regent Palace, opened in 1915. Lyons, who was the impetus behind the creation of Britain’s Territorial Force, was appointed to run the company, and it was named after him.

Sir Thomas Johnstone Lipton (1848–1931) was a Scotsman of Ulster-Scots parentage, a self-made merchant who created the Lipton tea brand. During the war Sir Thomas helped organizations of medical volunteers. He placed his yachts at the disposal of the Red Cross, the Scottish Women’s Hospitals Committee of Dr Elsie Inglis, and the Serbian Supporting Fund for the transport of medical volunteers and medical supplies. Sir Thomas even went to Serbia to meet wounded soldiers.

Lyons’ announcement of their injunction against Liptons.

The internment of over 32,000 German and Austro-Hungarian civilians in Britain between 1914 and 1919 took place against the background of a rising tide of xenophobia. Public opinion played an important role in pressuring the government to act. The main waves of internment, in October 1914 and May 1915, coincided with outbreaks of anti-foreigner violence in many British towns and cities, during which time German-owned property was destroyed or looted. Some Germans and Austrians were arrested for their own personal safety. The public was informed that these measures had been undertaken to safeguard the nation against internal spies and to appease the strong feelings against German atrocities in Belgium. Between November 1914 and February 1915 many internees were set free as public tensions eased.

Concern for national image also influenced how enemy aliens were treated after their arrest. In spite of the anti-German violence of 1914 and 1915, the conditions inside the camps were relatively good. Britain’s respect for class distinctions allowed privileged ‘gentlemen’s camps’ to be set up for wealthier inmates both at Douglas on the Isle of Man and Lofthouse Park near Wakefield. At no point during the war were women and children interned and civilian prisoners were entirely exempt from forced labour. This did not mean that life behind barbed wire was comfortable, but it did suggest that Britain was determined to protect its reputation as a civilised nation and to obey international law.

Spies and concrete tennis courts

So called German spies were blamed for everything. Recorded activities leading to suspicion and arrest as potential spies included handing sweets to children, as these could be poisoned; wearing a flamboyant or wide-brimmed hat; having an American accent; being a German chauffeur; or having a concrete-bottomed tennis court or ornamental lake. Rumours circulated that German barbers were intent on cutting the throats of their customers and German grocers were poisoning their customers’ food.

The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of November 1914 included the headline THE SPY SCARE. PRECAUTIONS AMONGST THE SURREY HILLS. Locals were particularly wary of ‘Germans and Austrians, who occupy houses in somewhat prominent positions on the hillsides’, the location chosen especially ‘for strategic reasons in warfare’. Their lawns could have concrete bases as ‘emplacements for heavy guns by invaders’. By publishing these stories the newspaper perpetuated the rumours, but assured the readers the police investigations had ruled out such activities because most of the houses were built before the foreigners moved into their current homes or the occupants had been naturalised many years before.

William J. Suhr the ‘enemy’ hairdresser of Bridge Street

William Suhr was aged 55 when the war broke out. He was a hairdresser, living and working at premises in Bridge Street, Leatherhead. In 1911 William and his wife Josephine had four children, including a daughter, Marie. What made working and living in the town especially difficult, when war was declared, was the fact that William had been born in Memel, East Prussia. Apart from the German language schoolmistress working at the Court school and Harriet Bates of Ferndown, Kingston Road, the 1911 Census shows William Suhr was the only Leatherhead resident who could be considered a German alien.

Bridge Street before 1914. William Suhr’s hairdressing shop window is seen on the left of the picture. The sign advertises cutting and shampooing. In the Victorian era hairdressers and barbers were often from France and German.

As anti-German sentiment increased, the Surrey Mirror reported in September 1914 the rounding up of London aliens which had begun in August. One Sunday morning in September 1914, 120 Germans and Austrians of military age were arrested, taken to Olympia and followed by a further 110 ‘enemy aliens’ on the following Monday. Although women, children and men over fifty-five were not interned, some were forcibly repatriated and others had to submit to a series of humiliating controls on their day-to-day activities. William and his wife would have been required to register with Leatherhead police, obey local curfews, refrain from entering prohibited areas, which by November 1914 included the entire east and greater part of the south coast, and were not allowed to own cars, motorcycles, cameras, military maps or homing pigeons.

The Suhr family were active members of Leatherhead’s community. In August of 1908 William was chosen as inquest foreman into the unexplained death of Alfred Martin, the proprietor of the Model Lodging House in Leatherhead. For over ten years William had sold tickets in his shop to the annual athletics sports meeting and presented the prizes he had donated at the Rifle Shooting competitions. Hairdressing was a male dominated and respected profession and his shop would have been patronized by the wealthier residents of Leatherhead. Regardless of their previous reputation in the community, William Suhr and his family had every reason to feel uncomfortable during the war. The papers were full of anti-German sentiment as cold-blooded murderers of Belgian babies. Feelings ran so high that even Dachshund dogs were stoned by the public, or destroyed by their owners, simply because of their German association.

In December 1914 the unimaginable happened. Without warning, German warships slipped through coastal defences and opened fire on Scarborough, Whitby and Hartlepool. Of the 119 people killed, forty-two were children. Soldiers fighting on the Front now feared for their families at home. The shocking tales of attack and occupation, told first hand to Leatherhead residents by the Belgian refugees now billeted in the town, did nothing to lessen the spirit of hatred towards the German people.

The Suhr family was likely to have become the focus of local gossip and the hairdressing shop may well have seen a drop in customers or suffered graffiti. News had recently reached Britain of the Germans’ large-scale use of chlorine gas deployed from cylinders at Langemark– Poelkapelle, north of Ypres on 22 April 1915. The Entente governments quickly claimed the attack was a flagrant violation of international law, although Germany argued that the Hague Treaty had only banned chemical shells, rather than the use of gas projectors. A couple of weeks later on 7 May the German U-boat U-20 torpedoed and sank the passenger ship the Lusitania. Of the 1,924 aboard 1,119 people died. Anti-German sentiment spilled out into the streets of the cities and suburbs.

A postcard commemorating the loss of the Lusitania fuelled xenophobic attitudes.

When news of the Lusitania’s fate reached Britain, Germans in Manchester, Liverpool and London were attacked. Over the following days some were pursued into their homes, thrown through windows into the street, others were ducked in troughs or publicly stripped of their clothes. The police, assisted by special constables, and in some cases the Territorials, did what they could to protect the fleeing aliens, but ferocious crowds were determined to make their point.

William Suhr and his family must have faced open criticism, possibly even worse. In May 1915 the government resumed its move towards wholesale internment of male enemy aliens aged 17 to 55; at this time William Suhr was fifty-six and had just escaped calls for his internment. The total number of those interned in the United Kingdom rose from 12,871 on 13 May 1915 to 32,440 by 22 November 1915.

William must have felt compelled to do something in his defence so he wrote to the editor of the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser. His statement appeared in the 15 May 1915 edition of the paper under the headline THE ALIEN QUESTION – EMPHATIC REPUDIATION FROM LEATHERHEAD:

‘Sir – It has seemed to me that since the commitment of that horrible crime, the sinking of the Lusitania, some inhabitants of Leatherhead are looking upon me as part and parcel of the horde who, led by that madman the German Emperor, have committed numerous foul deeds, ending in the slaughter of innocent women, children and men.

I feel that slur very deeply, in fact it has become a nightmare which gives me no rest day or night, and I take these means of publicly stating that on the declaration of war I sent to the Home Office a complete and detailed statement of my movements and actions since the day I landed in England (31 years ago) asking for naturalisation, the papers for which I filled up, gaining the sponsorship of four of the most respected gentlemen of Leatherhead, the Reverend St Clare Hill MA, Mr W. Hewlin, Mr W.H. Brown and Mr L. Dixon. In filling up those papers I declared that I wish no longer to be considered the subject of that madman, the German Emperor, the instigator of this horrible war. I have sworn to those declarations in the presence of the above named witnesses, before the commissioner of oaths, Mr B.C. Stenning; moreover my wife and children are British born, my eldest son enlisted in Canada, while the younger has narrowly escaped being torpedoed.

I hope this statement will be received in the spirit in which it is made.’

William signed off his letter William J. Suhr, Bridge Street, Leatherhead and presumably hoped it would be enough to quell any further hostility towards the family. The hostile attitude of the locals must have persisted for William wrote a further letter, which also appeared in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser under the headline ENEMY ALIENS – A PROTEST FROM LEATHERHEAD:

‘To the Editor.

Sir, I thank you for your courtesy in allotting to my letter some valuable space in last week’s issue of your esteemed paper, but some of your readers do not seem wholly satisfied and since I am earnestly desirous of stilling all doubts I crave your kind permission to clear up some points which have been questioned. As to my wife, she is no half-bred German; she belongs to a loyal Folkestone family, and not only a loyal family but also an actively patriotic one, which is represented in the British Army by one colonel, who was specially honoured by the late Lord Roberts with compliments and thanks for his services in the last Boer War, one captain, and six younger men, most of who also hold commissions, all in active service. My youngest son has not enlisted because he has had two sharp turns of rheumatic fever, which left his heart weak: he has been, and is, now serving on board the New Zealand SS Opawa, on her way to New Zealand. Finally, I did not get naturalised before, because during the long years I have lived in England I have met with nothing but kindness, which has made me feel so very much at home that I never thought of myself as an alien, and the thought of war between England and Germany never entered my mind. It seems so utterly impossible, and now it has alas! become a reality, I pray for its speedy termination and the undoing of its instigator. I am willing to furnish the names of my wife’s relatives serving in the Army to any responsible inquirer.

Yours William J. Suhr, 19 May 1915.

We do not know if William’s second letter made any difference to his situation but events were not working to his advantage, for on the night of 31 May 1915, within a couple weeks of William’s second letter, a single German Zeppelin airship appeared over north London and dropped its deadly cargo on the city below. This was the first time that the capital had been bombed from the air.

The German military used two types of airship. Zeppelins had a rigid aluminium framework with separate gasbags of inflammable hydrogen lifting gas held inside. An outer skin of linen covered the whole structure and below the framework were the gondolas containing the control room, engines, crew, machine guns and bombs. A second type of airship made by Schütte-Lanz had a framework of wood. To the British people all German airships were simply known as ‘Zeppelins’. Surrey was also on the Zeppelin hit list as bombs fell on Croydon and in the St Catherine’s area of Guildford in October 1915. No one was killed locally but a sense of terror was particularly strong in the Home Counties; insurance against damage from Zeppelins dramatically increased.

The SS Opawa on which Frederick Suhr, William’s youngest son served. The ship was delivered in 1906 and requisitioned from the New Zealand Shipping Company by the Admiralty between April 1917 and April 1919. It was sold to the Japanese and renamed the Tonan Maru. The ship was torpedoed in 1943 by US submarine Bowfish while operating as a tanker.

A Zeppelin photographed over Epsom, towards Leatherhead, on its way to bomb Guildford on 13 October 1915. The only casualty was a swan. (Surrey Libraries)

The Suhr family do not appear in the local papers again until the edition of 28 October 1916 when it was announced, PRIVATE SUHR A PRISONER. Private Stewart Suhr of the Canadian Forces had been reported missing. News then arrived on 19 October that he had died of wounds. The following day the Canadian Record Office confirmed he had been wounded and was a prisoner of war in Germany but doing well. Stewart had been in Canada for nine years before the outbreak of war, at which time he joined the Canadian forces. He had arrived in England in March 1916 but only for a fortnight before he was sent to France as a sniper; there is no mention whether he had managed to meet up with his family at that time.

Zeppelin Insurance by the London Guarantee & Accident Company. Other insurance companies would not offer such cover because it would be impossible to pay out in the event of a German invasion.

Sadly for William Suhr anti-German attitudes did not end with the war. The British Empire Union (BEU) was created in 1916, after changing its name from the Anti-German Union, in April 1915; it published a regular journal right up until 1952. The organisation claimed to stand for ‘patriotism, social reform, industrial peace, promotion of the Empire and anti-socialism’. On 28 July 1916 the vice-presidents, Lord and Lady Bathurst, placed a full-page advertisement in The Morning Post stating their objectives, one of which was to alter the existing naturalisation laws, rendering it impossible for aliens seeking naturalisation to become British citizens so long as they remain subjects of other countries. In addition they sought to spread ‘Educational propaganda’ which perpetuated xenophobia after the war.

Anti-German poster 1919.

Ten years after the end of the war William, aged 69, died of a heart attack while working in his shop. His obituary of 23 November 1928 in the Surrey Mirror highlights the difficulties the Suhr family faced in the war. The paper stated the family were long standing residents of Leatherhead and much-respected. William had been a hairdresser in Bridge Street for twenty-eight years but ‘he suffered severely during the war – much more severely, indeed, than those much-vaunted British virtues, justice and humanity, should have permitted.’ Of his children, the two boys had served and survived the war and were now living in South Africa and Canada. The article mentions William’s two daughters, one in Eastbourne and the other, Marie, living with her parents in Leatherhead.

William Suhr’s hairdressers (left of picture), Bridge Street, Leatherhead in the 1920s and still in business.

CHAPTER 7

Conscription and Reaction

In 1914 the British Army had approximately 710,000 men at its disposal including reserves but only 80,000 of them were regular troops trained and ready to fight. Secretary of State for War, Lord Kitchener recognised that this force was far too small in comparison with the French and German armies and wanted to build an army of seventy divisions. Conscription for both the British public and government was, at this stage, a step too far. By January 1915 more than one million men had joined the armed forces voluntarily.

However, by the summer of 1915 the numbers of recruits had begun to fall off. In response the National Registration Act was introduced in order to compile a list of all men fit for military service who were still available. Conscription was introduced in January 1916 for single men aged between 18 to 41 (later extended to 51) and conscription for married men followed shortly afterwards. Any man who was called up for service could appeal to a local Military Service Tribunal. Reasons for appeal could include health, already doing war work, or on moral and religious grounds. Those appealing for moral or religious reasons became known as Conscientious Objectors.

Approximately 750,000 men appealed against their conscriptions in the first six months. The tribunal could grant exemptions, but these were often only temporary. Only 2 per cent of those who appeared before the local tribunals could be considered Conscientious Objectors; 6,000 were sent to prison, thirty-five received the death sentence but this was commuted to a ten year prison sentence instead.

Military Service Act 1916 Public Notification.

It was increasingly difficult for the men of Leatherhead to avoid the constant pressure to enlist. The Roll of Honour, published in the local papers and Parish Magazine, listed the names of all those in the community who had enlisted. Those who had already enlisted would have been known to those who remained at home and their stories from the front line added to the sense of guilt at remaining at home. The town was full of posters and the recruiting office was located in the prominent position of Bridge Street. The notion by some that the men left behind were shirkers or cowards was often publically expressed; the suffragettes had taken it upon themselves to issue white feathers to those they felt were avoiding their duty.

British Army recruits in London 1914.

For many men, however, awareness of their responsibilities towards their families as wage earners proved a compelling disincentive to volunteer. The levels of compensation offered to the families of men who enlisted were often not sufficient to avert the risk of hardship or even destitution to wives and children or elderly parents. Propaganda posters emphasised a powerful sense of duty to family to counteract such loyalties. Would children, in the future, hold their fathers to account on the service that they performed for their country rather than the social protection that they ensured for their immediate family?

In the spring of 1915 it was increasingly clear the war was not going to be over any time soon and the cost in human lives was mounting. Virtually every issue of the local papers informed the reader of another life lost.

The papers were full of stories of the bravery of those were away.

In 1915 British illustrator Savile Lumley designed this famous guilt-inducing poster. Paul Gunn later explained the background to the poster: ‘One night my father came home very worried about the war situation and discussed with my mother whether he should volunteer. He happened to come in to where I was asleep and quite casually said to my mother, if I don’t join the forces whatever will I say to Paul if he turns round to me and says, what did you do in the Great War, Daddy? He suddenly turned round to my mother and said that would make a marvellous slogan for a recruiting poster. He shot off to see one of his pet artists, Savile Lumley, had a sketch drawn straight away.’

Newspaper announcement of the death of Private William Albert Bussey. As a member of the Silver Band and VAD William would have been well known in Leatherhead. Corporal A.T. Bullen of Leatherhead, in the same company, wrote to the Bussey family ‘he died doing his duty bravely and nobly for his King and country’ and went on to say ‘all the Leatherhead boys send their deepest sympathy’. William’s brother Ben survived the war.

Private William Alfred Bussey.

Lord Derby and National Registration

It was at the suggestion of Edward Stanley, 17th Earl of Derby (1865-1948), that the government passed the National Registration Act on 15 July 1915 as a step towards stimulating recruitment and to discover how many men between the ages of 15 and 65 were engaged in each trade. All those in this age range who were not already in the military were obliged to register, giving details of their employment. The results of this census were available by mid-September 1915 and indicated there were almost five million men of military age who were not in the forces, of which 1.6 million were in protected, high or scarce skilled jobs.

On 11 October 1915 Lord Derby was appointed Director General of Recruiting. He brought forward a programme five days later called the Derby Scheme, although its official title was the Group Scheme, for raising the numbers. Men aged 18 to 40 were informed that under the scheme they could continue to enlist voluntarily or attest with an obligation to come if called up later on. The War Office notified the public that voluntary enlistment would soon cease and that the last day of registration would be 15 December 1915. Leatherhead’s part of the National Register was maintained by a clerk who was paid £5 8s 6d, for each half year, by the Local Government Board.

Edward Stanley 17th Earl of Derby (1865-1948).

Men who attested under the Derby Scheme, who were accepted for service and chose to defer it, were classified as being in Class A. Those who agreed to immediate service were Class B. The Class A men were paid a day’s army pay for the day they attested and were given a grey armband with a red crown as a sign they had volunteered. These men were then transferred Section B Army Reserve and sent back to their homes and jobs until they were called up.

National Registration Card. The National Registration Act 1915 provided a register of all persons between the ages of 15 and 65, who were not members of the Armed Forces. The central registration authority was the Registrar General acting under the direction of the Local Government Board, while the councils of metropolitan and municipal boroughs and all urban and rural districts were the local registration authorities. The information supplied under the Act provided manpower statistics and also enabled the military authorities to discriminate between persons who should be called up for military service and those who should in the national interest be retained in civil employment.

Derby Scheme armband.

In total 215,000 men enlisted while the scheme was on and another 2,185,000 attested for deferred enlistment. It soon became apparent that 38 per cent of single men and 54 per cent of those married, who were not in reserved occupations, had still avoided this form of recruitment. Their silence did much to hasten a move to full conscription. Voluntary attestation reopened on 10 January 1916, while the government considered the position.

Call up under the Derby Scheme began in the last two weeks of January 1916. The last single groups, other than the 18 year olds, were called up in March. This last batch were called up in parallel to the first men to be summoned under conscription under the Military Service Act. Attestation under the scheme ceased on 1 March 1916. At this stage of the war the recruits were not necessarily posted to their local regiments.

Voluntary attestation under the Derby Scheme.

On 6 September 1916 a start was made by posting notices announcing the formation of a new Group B. This was to be open for voluntary attestation of those born in 1899, with the assurance that they would not be called for service until they reached 18. At the same time all men in Group A and those in Class A who were born in 1898 were informed that they would be required to serve from the age of 18 years and 7 months (previously 18 and 8 months). This category began to be mobilised from 7 October 1916.

A meeting was held on 6 November 1916, at the Leatherhead Institute, to decide how to apply Lord Derby’s recruitment scheme locally. A letter was read from the president of the Local Government Board informing those present how to deal with the appeals of men eligible to serve in the Army. Mr Fairs asked how many single men they had working for the council. The surveyor said they only had one or two. The chairman said it was a very important circular and, as the committee would have very considerable power, it was worthy of their serious consideration so it was decided to hold a special meeting of the Council.

Across Britain there were 8,000 recorded attempts to avoid conscription during the war. Many men sought exemption based on medical, family, or economic grounds. Those finding themselves before Leatherhead’s Military Tribunal would supply letters, medical certificates, statements, and even religious pamphlets to support their case. In the years after the war instructions were issued to all local government boards that tribunal material should be destroyed, however the local newspapers gave an account of each tribunal.

The tribunals played an important part in the process of conscription, although they were not recruiting bodies. Leatherhead’s tribunal meetings were held in the evenings at the council offices. The chairman was Thomas J. Leavey, a local tailor and shopkeeper. Leavey’s son Thomas James Leavey junior enlisted on 4 November 1914, aged 35, at Epsom into the Royal Fusiliers and was discharged from home service due to ill health in March 1918. It is highly likely Thomas Leavey senior expected the men of Leatherhead to follow the example set by his son, despite the fact he lost his son’s employ in the family business. Additional members of the tribunal were the Swan Brewery manager, John W. James, Herbert Kempson Reeves. a solicitor living at the Manor House, F.H. Walker. a carpenter, W.J. Weller, a butcher, Stephen Mould, an ironmonger and Frederick Kingsnorth, a baker. Mr E.T. Wade was the local representative of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries and was the estate steward at Randalls Park.

A man ‘going before the tribunal’ to plead his case against being conscripted into the army. (Tony Allen World War 1 postcards)

Certificate of Exemption. (National Archives)

Military Tribunal Exemption Certificate.

Henry Gibson Rivington (second row, second man seated on the left), a member of the Parish Church Choir around 1952.

Henry Gibson Rivington (1872–1954).

Henry Gibson Rivington, the military representative who sat on the Leatherhead Military Tribunal, lived at Bedwyn, St Nicholas Hill, Leatherhead. He graduated from Oxford and became a solicitor. His service papers say he signed on as a Territorial when he was 45 years old.

The brutally brief hearings tended to last around ten minutes and those appealing were usually represented by a solicitor or friend who would help defend them. Both the applicant and the military representative had the right of appeal, so it could go to a further tribunal after that, made up of members appointed by the Crown. Nationally the majority of appeals were dismissed and many people did go on to see war service.

Employers could apply to the tribunal on behalf of their staff if they had reason to believe a particular person was vital to their operations. On 22 April 1916, Mr J. Young, secretary of the Leatherhead Gas Company, applied for the temporary exemption of Arthur Holmes, of 2 Golf View, Kingston Road. Holmes was a much needed fitter, without him the Gas Company argued they would not be able to offer a service.

Rivington typically objected to all applications for exemption and Holmes’s case was no different. Rivington believed the Gas Board should have taken steps to replace any eligible member of staff. Young stated the Minister of Munitions was still deciding if gas fitters should be exempt from military service and complained that the Gas Company had already lost fourteen men into the Army. The application for temporary exemption was refused and the Gas Company was expected to manage without Holmes.

At the same tribunal sitting F.C. Bucknill, a carpenter of Woodbridge, Leatherhead, asked for temporary exemption because of his wife’s ill health. Mr Rivington once again objected and the application was refused.

Venthams, the coach and car manufacturers applied in April 1916 for the exemption of three of their staff – W.P. People, A.W. Beckwith and W. Wickens – on the grounds that they were all engaged in necessary work. This was the manufacture of munitions but the papers were careful not to print details. Once again Mr Rivington objected to the application but said at this stage he had no choice but to approve the exemption; he had, however, referred the matter to the Minister of Munitions.

On 1st July 1916 Venthams were once again back before the tribunal on behalf of their staff, Mr Fielder, Mr Voller and Mr Newland, on the grounds they were employed in ‘Government work’. Mr Rivington said they were only exempt if they had badges from the Ministry of Munitions and as such criticised Venthams for not making applications to the ministry for the badges. Edward Ventham said that although Fielder was used to drive the Ventham car, he had not done so before completing ten hours munitions work. This time Ventham staff were not so lucky as the application was refused.

The Karn Brothers, motor car manufacturers, of Kingston Road, Leatherhead were also involved in munitions work during the war. At the tribunal for their staff the panel were shown three contracts on behalf of the government which the firm would be unable to fill if exemption was not granted to the staff; the exemptions were granted.

What is especially interesting, in a small town such as Leatherhead, are the cases where tradesmen in competition with those on the panel, applied for exemption. Panel member Mr Bucknill had a carpentry business in Leatherhead when Mr R. Huggett, a 38-year-old carpenter of Bridge Street, attended the tribunal to request exemption. Huggett maintained because three of his employees had enlisted, he now only had one man in the business. Mr Rivington suggested a temporary exemption until 31 July and said he did not believe the business would suffer if it closed for the duration of the war.

Leatherhead’s tribunal did appear to be harsh in its enforcement of the Conscription Act. Alfred Allen applied for exemption on 1 July 1916 – unbeknown to those in Leatherhead, this was the opening day of the Battle of the Somme when the British Army suffered its worst losses. Allen was a 38-year-old licensed victualler of the Prince of Wales, Leatherhead. He requested exemption because it would be impossible for his business to carry on without him. Allen also wanted the tribunal to consider the support he had given to the local community; he was a fellow member of the Leatherhead Urban Council and board member of the Joint Isolation Hospital. Allen also protested that he had played his part in the conscription process by inspecting all the National Registration Applications of the district. Mr Rivington once again permitted a limited exemption of two months to enable Allen to make arrangements for the business to continue without him.

If the Leatherhead Military Tribunal gave exemption to an individual, the decision could be immediately overturned by the Surrey Appeal Tribunal in Guildford. On 21 October 1916 William Worsfold, a chimney sweep and firewood merchant, from Bridge Street was brought before the tribunal. He had been granted exemption from service at the Leatherhead Tribunal but Mr Rivington had appealed against the decision. William had joined the East Surrey Territorials on 18 August 1913. When the war broke out he volunteered to go overseas with his regiment to India. He returned from India on 15 December 1915 and was honourably discharged, as his service period had expired. William’s father had died in January 1915, while four of his sons were fighting overseas. The Worsfolds had been a family of eight according to the 1911 Census; there were an additional two children who had died before the census. By February 1915 Jane Worsfold, wife of William Worsfold Senior was living in Leatherhead, as a widow, with two teenage children at home and four sons fighting overseas.

It appears that William’s intention was to support his mother and get the family business back in order. His uncle had kept the business running while William was in India but his uncle was now ill. On 21 November 1916 William married Elizabeth Skene Murrison at the church of St Mary and St Nicholas. His younger brother Ernest and sister Nellie were witnesses. The wedding took place shortly after William’s exemption was revoked.

William was conscripted back into 3 Company, 1st Battalion of the East Surrey Regiment on 7 December 1916. He was wounded on 18 Feb 1917, sent to a Casualty Clearing Station and re-joined the battalion on 14 May 1917. In Oct 1917 he was promoted to lance corporal and on 18 Oct 1917 he was sent on a Lewis Gun course. He was killed in action on 21 August 1918 and his body was never found. William’s name is listed on the Vis-en-Artois Memorial.

Elizabeth was married to William for nine months when she was widowed. In 1920 she remarried, her second husband was Edwin Alfred Brittan, a wounded soldier, who had been invalided out of the East Kent Regiment in November 1916.

William Worsfold’s exemption till 31 December 1916 was overturned by the Surrey Appeal Tribunal. (Betty Worsfold and Leatherhead History Society/Taken Not Given Leatherhead Memorials)

Charles Mortimer Wild, a 35-year-old watch and clockmaker, attended the Leatherhead Tribunal on 2 August 1917. Mr Wild lived at 4 Burton Villas, Poplar Road, Leatherhead and worked for Palmer & Sons. Charles stated he was C3 fit, of little use for clerical work and his employment at Palmer & Son enabled the proprietor to ‘carry on a farm’. The application was refused, especially as Rivington felt Wild’s mechanical knowledge could be of use to the Army. Charles survived the war and died in Surrey aged 71.

Fred Palmer Watchmakers who employed Charles Mortimer Wild.

By the end of June 1916, 748,587 men had applied to tribunals. The majority were given some kind of exemption, usually temporary for up to six months, or conditional depending on their situation at work or home remaining serious enough to warrant their retention at home. In October 1.12 million men nationally held tribunal exemptions or had cases pending, by May 1917 this had fallen to 780,000 exempt and 110,000 pending. At this point there were also 1.8 million men with exemptions granted by the government, including those working in war industries. Tribunal and government exemptions collectively came to more men than were serving overseas with the British Army.

Mr Sidney Reginald Drake was the surveyor and sanitary inspector for the Leatherhead Urban District Council. He lived at Gravel Hill, Leatherhead with his wife Ethel May (nee Williams) Drake. Sidney was well known in the community and member of the popular Leatherhead Amateur Dramatic and Operatic Society. On the evening of 2 August 1917 he faced the Leatherhead Military Tribunal. The council requested Sidney should be exempt from military service on the grounds that his council work was of vital use to the town and a conditional exemption was agreed to by Rivington. For those on the tribunal panel it must have been very difficult to be objective; T.J. Leavey, the chairman, was not only Drake’s employer but a fellow amateur actor with the Leatherhead Drama and Operatic Society.

An article in the Litchfield Mercury relating to the problems of interpreting the Conscription Act.

Coming to the attention of a magistrate could often lead to questions regarding eligibility for service. (DLA 13 October 1917)

Mr Drake was a section leader for the Leatherhead VAD.

Sidney Drake before the war.

CHAPTER 8

Who’s Absent? Loss, Remembrance and Return

At the beginning of the war Leatherhead’s residents shared the nation’s determination to play their part in winning the war. Families had proudly said goodbye to their sons, fathers and brothers, then keenly watched the Royal Fusiliers (UPS) come into the town to train. In some small way the University and Public School soldiers offered them a window into the military world of their own family members.

The honeymoon period for Leatherhead’s residents was short lived as the death of Captain Henry Gratten Elliot was announced in late September 1914 (see Chapter 2), followed on 18 December by the death of Private Albert Henry Bennett. These two families became the first of many in Leatherhead to mourn the loss of a son. The 1911 Census tells us the Bennetts were living at 3 Waverley Cottages, The Crescent, Leatherhead. Albert’s parents, William and Ada, had begun married life in Warnham, Sussex before moving to Leatherhead. William was a bricklayer and labourer. The family had four children but by 1911 only three sons had survived childhood – Archie, Albert and Horace.

Parliamentary Recruiting Committee Poster.

The War Office confirmed to Mr and Mrs Bennett in January 1915 that Private Albert Bennett of the 2nd Battalion of the Queen’s (Royal West Surrey) Regiment had been killed, aged 19, in action in the Ploegsteert area of the Ypres Salient. Albert had been in the West Surrey Regiment for nearly two years when he was sent to the Front on 26 October 1914. The local papers spoke of the sympathies of ‘a large circle of acquaintances’ demonstrating how widely Albert’s loss was felt in the town. He was especially well known locally as a member of the Church Lads’ Brigade.

Announcement of the death of Captain Henry Gratten Elliot on 20 September 1914, one of the first to die with a connection to Leatherhead.

Albert’s body was never recovered from the battlefield; his name joined the 11,000 missing servicemen listed on the Ploegsteert Memorial in Belgium. Most of those commemorated on the memorial did not die in major offensives, but were killed in the course of the day-to-day attrition of trench warfare which characterised this part of the line, or in small scale engagements, usually carried out in support of major attacks taking place elsewhere. After the war the Bennett family moved to Caterham. Alfred’s name was added to the Leatherhead War Memorial although his date of death was recorded as the 14 December 1914.

The first loss of a naval serviceman to a Leatherhead family was of Private Victor E. Wright, aged 18, who went down with HMS Formidable on 1 January 1915. His parents were living at Highlandene, The Crescent, Leatherhead. Victor had been hoping to get home as a surprise for Christmas 1914 but his leave was cancelled at the last minute. There had been reports of submarine activity while HMS Formidable carried out its patrol with the 5th Battle Squadron in the English Channel, but these were ignored as the weather was thought to be too poor for the Germans to launch an attack. The ship was hit by two torpedoes fired from the German U-boat U-24. The loss of life was considerable: thirty-five officers (including Captain Arthur Loxley) and 512 men, including Victor, from a complement of about 750. This was the first British battleship to be sunk by a German submarine.

A familiar feature of the local papers became the ‘Roll of the Fallen’. (DLA 30 December 1916)

HMS Formidable which sank on 1 January 1915 after being hit by two torpedoes.

Initially keen to join up, the realities of war meant the servicemen spent much of their time longing for home. Headmaster E.H. Burgess received a letter from one of his old pupils, Ernest Edward Dean, born in 1897. Edward was serving in Salonika with the Royal Flying Corps in October 1916 when he wrote to inform those at home he had been promoted to corporal, and was carrying out the confidential shorthand and typing for the colonel. Ernest wrote that despite the warmer temperature and ‘strange animals’ he would not know he was out of England,

‘but when one visits the town itself one is forcibly reminded of the fact. The roads and pavement are awful, and the majority of people are dirty, and everyone speaks in a manner that leaves one in doubt as to whether they are swearing at you or not. But through all this is the fact that we know there is still such a place as London, and much more – Leatherhead – and look for the time when the boys who come back will celebrate their return to Blighty.’

When the war was over and the men returned home, Leatherhead may have seemed as alien as Salonika did to Edward Dean. There were food shortages, rationing and often lengthy queues at the shops. Many of the women in Leatherhead had replaced the men in every sort of employment; as a reward the government in 1917 had agreed to women’s suffrage. The Representation of the Peoples Act gave the vote to men over twenty-one and women over the age of thirty, if they qualified as householders or additional property qualifications. Non-essential work, such as painting, had stopped during the war and with so many business owners struggling to manage with fewer staff, Leatherhead was certainly a drearier and shabbier version of its pre-1914 self. Coal, gas and electricity had also been reduced, creating colder and darker homes. Tragically the Spanish influenza pandemic swept the country; worldwide influenza would kill more people in the space of a year than the war did in its entirety. Those who died tended to be the previously young and healthy, although returning wounded soldiers were especially vulnerable.

Ethel Mary Dean of Church Walk in 1922. At the time of receiving Ernest’s letter from Salonika Ethel, his sister, was 8 years old.

The war had been expected to last into 1919, so when the battlefields fell silent at 11am on 11 November 1918, it was a welcome surprise. The news of the Armistice reached Leatherhead shortly after eleven o’clock and the announcement rapidly spread from home to home. Flags were soon flying from businesses and homes across the town. Many residents spent the day decorating and taking to the streets to celebrate. Munitions workers from Bookham ceased work at one o’clock and piled onto a traction engine and trolley, decorated with flags, to pass through Leatherhead’s High Street. The restrictions were ignored at St Mary and St Nicholas Church and the church bells rang out into the evening. The bugle band of the Church Lads’ Brigade paraded the town well into the night. The following day many residents took a holiday to continue the party and in the evening the traditional town bonfire was lit at the Bull Inn; it burned so well it set alight the surrounding elm trees. The locals swiftly came together to organise a thanksgiving service at the Victoria Hall on Sunday, 17 November. The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of 16 November 1918 commented, ‘happy faces being an eloquent token for the immense relief, after four years of war, that the glad tidings had brought to one and all.’

The Leatherhead bell ringing team and friends in 1923. These were most likely the men that sounded the bells on Armistice Day.

The end of the war for many residents and soldiers was an anticlimax. Those who had fought did not return home straightaway as the process and timing of each soldier depended on his terms of service. Soldiers of the Regular Army remained in service until their years were done. Men who had volunteered or who were conscripted for war service were released at varying stages. It was practically impossible to process all men in a short period of time but the British Army still had commitments to fulfil, in Germany, North Russia and in the garrisons of Empire. Men with scarce industrial skills were released early and those who had volunteered early in the war were given priority treatment. The conscripts, especially the 18 year olds of 1918, were left until last. Most of the servicemen of Leatherhead were back in civilian life by the end of 1919; not all of them found it easy to find work as unemployment in the town reached 200 by 1921 and increased every month.

Once the men were discharged from the Army they were given four weeks leave, a ration card, railway warrant and some civilian clothes. For those who did make it back to Leatherhead the town was very different. Food was still scarce, the Spanish flu raged, their jobs were not necessarily waiting for them, and society had irreversibly changed.

With increasing unemployment, Leatherhead men took out advertisements asking for work. The expression ‘Do anything. Go anywhere’, became a familiar phrase in the personal columns. (DLA 25 July 1919)

Commemorating the Dead

Returning soldiers were a distinct reminder that not all Leatherhead’s men would ever return and thoughts began to move towards how best to commemorate those who had lost their lives and to extend the role of the war shrine at the Clock Tower. On 21 March 1917 the Bishop of Winchester came to Leatherhead to dedicate a war shrine which had been erected on the Clock Tower in North Street. The women of the town had organised the shrine and it included 826 Leatherhead men who were serving in the Army or Navy. Fifty-six of those listed had died during the conflict up to that point. The shrine had been made by Mr Grantham from a design created by the committee.

The central panel contained the names of the fallen and underneath were the words ‘Greater love hath no man than that he gave his life for his friends’. The list at the time of the service was incomplete and additions were constantly being made; the box beside the shrine allowed anyone to place the names and the regiments of their relatives serving who were not on the list already. Members of the council and Leatherhead’s Military Tribunal were also present. The Volunteer Corps attended as did some of the wounded soldiers from the Red House Hospital.

Mr Grantham in costume for the Leatherhead Drama and Operatic Society before the war. Mr Grantham built the shrine and organised the dedication service.

The Bishop in his dedication said, ‘those who had gone, and those who, thank God, remained, alive, would rebuke and chastise them if words of sorrow were used that day.’ He continued, ‘they had learnt again during these terrible years the wonderful lessons of what it was that really made human life great. Service and sacrifice those were the things which ennobled human life.’

The shrine was later removed to St Mary and St Nicholas Church and the larger Sons of Leatherhead memorial erected nearby.

The Rev. Hobson’s notes regarding the Dedication of the War Shrine, 21 March 1917.

Unveiling of the Leatherhead Roll of Honour at the War Shrine, 21 March 1917.

Service of Dedication at the War Shrine, 21 March 1917.

The Bishop of Winchester at the unveiling of the Roll of Honour at the War Shrine, 21 March 1917.

The Taylor Family – ‘The door was never locked again’

When the war started Louisa Taylor was no stranger to loss as she had already lost her daughters Alice, Dorothy and Florence, her son George and granddaughters Lillian and Louise. By the end of the war Louisa’s sons Frederick, William, Alfred and Percy had also died. Louisa’s great-granddaughter Marion Haines recollects that after the war ‘her door was never locked again’ just in case the boys did come home from the battlefield.

The 26 June 1915 edition of the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser was proud to reproduce the photographs of the five sons of Louisa and Frederick Taylor of Woodbridge, Kingston Road who were serving in the Army. Four sons had joined since the outbreak of war. At the time of the report William had already served eight years in the Army and was in Egypt, Frederick and Alfred were with the British Expeditionary Force, Arthur was in training in Dover and John Taylor was stationed at Chatham. At the time of the report Frederick, aged 32, had already died at Ypres.

Louisa Taylor was a feisty woman. At the Leatherhead Rose football matches before the war, she would run onto the pitch and wave her umbrella at any player who fouled one of her sons.

Private Frederick Benjamin Taylor 3rd Battalion of Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment), born 1883, died 24 May 1915.

Private Frederick Benjamin Taylor, 3rd Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers proceeded to France, via Southampton, landing at Le Havre in mid-January 1915. The division concentrated in the area between Bailleul and Hazebrouck, being joined by additional Territorial units. In early April 1915, following the northward extension of their lines, Frederick arrived in the Ypres Salient. The arrival of units of General Smith-Dorrien’s Second Army coincided with German plans to seize the trenches running through houses occupied by the 1st Royal Scots Fusiliers, the high ground around Pilckem and Langemarck, which involved, notoriously, the use of poison gas.

In the late afternoon of 22 April a strong German thrust was made against the north of the Salient. This attack was supported by the discharge of chlorine gas in the direction of trenches between Langemarck and the Yser Canal, manned by the two remaining French Divisions in the Ypres sector. The alarmed and helpless defenders retreated, leaving a gap of over four miles on the left flank of the nearest British forces. During the night nearby Canadian units improvised a series of scattered outposts across the breach and secured a defensive line. Numerous counter-attacks the following day held off further German advances. A renewed German assault at dawn on 24 April, again using gas, against the Canadians was temporarily held, but the attackers surged on beyond St Julien by afternoon.

The critical days that followed saw relentless British counter-attacks in deference to French requests to regain lost ground. The futility of such operations was eventually acknowledged and at the beginning of May the British forces withdrew to a new line, barely three miles from Ypres. Heavy fighting continued and on 8 May the Germans seized ground on the Frezenberg Ridge, where desperate actions continued to 13 May. Later, on 24 May, the largest German gas attack secured ground either side of Bellewaarde Lake, despite resolute British defence.

Thirty-three days of incessant fighting saw no decisive German breakthrough, though the British were left holding a much-reduced Salient even more vulnerable to German artillery bombardment. Frederick died on 24 May 1915. His body was never identified on the battlefield so he is remembered on the Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial as one of the missing.

Private 8388 William James Alfred Taylor Oxford & Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, born 1888, died 19 January 1917.

Private William Taylor, served with the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry (Ox and Bucks) on the Western Front. The regiment was in action during the Battle of the Somme (1 July – 18 November 1916), suffering heavily, including at Mametz Wood, Pozières and at the Ancre, the last major subsidiary battle. On 28 July the 2nd Ox and Bucks moved to front-line trenches near Waterlot Farm and sustained heavy casualties at the battle there on 30 July. They fought on the Somme battlefield at Delville Wood, Guillemont and on 13 November in the Battle of the Ancre: a large attack on the Redan Ridge where they sustained many casualties. British operations on the Ancre from 10 January – 22 February 1917, forced the Germans back five miles on a four-mile front, and eventually took 5,284 prisoners. William Taylor died on 7 January 1917 during the battle and is buried at the Guard’s Cemetery, Combles, Somme.

Private Alfred Taylor, served with the 11th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers which was formed at Hounslow on 6 September 1914 and came under command of 54 Brigade, 18th (Eastern) Division. The division initially concentrated in the Colchester area but moved to Salisbury Plain in May 1915. They proceeded to France in July, landing at Boulogne and moved to Flesselles on the Somme where in 1916 they were in action in the Battle of Albert, capturing their objectives near Montauban. In 1917 they took part in the operations on the Ancre including Miraumont and the capture of Irles; they fought during the German retreat to the Hindenburg Line and in the Third Battle of the Scarpe before moving to Flanders. There they were in action in the Battle of Pilckem Ridge and the Battle of Langemarck during the Third Battle of Ypres (31 July – 10 November 1917), a major British offensive also known as Passchendaele. In over 100 days of fighting no strategic breakthrough was achieved and the five-mile advance left the British in occupation of an enlarged and highly vulnerable salient, at a cost of an estimated 250,000 casualties. Alfred was one of them. He died on 10 August 1917 and is buried at Hooge Crater Cemetery.

Private 9823 Alfred James Taylor, 11th Battalion Royal Fusiliers. Born in 1892, died 10 August 1917.

Soldiers with trophy German helmets after battle.

Private Percy Edward Taylor, born in 1898, served with the Royal Sussex Regiment, as part of the 4th Reserve Battalion. Percy served as part of the home service ‘second line’ at Tunbridge Wells in September 1916. His death certificate shows he died of tuberculosis of the lung and exhaustion at his home in Kingston Road, Leatherhead on the 9 October 1917, while being tended by his mother Louisa. He was buried at St Mary and St Nicholas Churchyard, Leatherhead where both his parents would eventually join him. Despite his army home service and being given a standard Commonwealth war gravestone, Percy’s name was not engraved alongside his three other brothers on the Leatherhead War Memorial; many believe his name should now be added.

Cap badge of the Royal Sussex Regiment.

Private 19110 John (Jack) Taylor 2nd Royal West Surrey Regiment (The Queens). Born 1895, died after 1941.

Louisa and Percy Taylor’s grave at St Mary and St Nicholas Church, Leatherhead, tended by Mrs C. Randall, Louisa’s sister.

Private John Taylor served with the 2nd Queen’s (Royal West Surrey Regiment) which took part in the Battle of the Somme. They saw action at Danzig Alley, Albert and Bazentin. Their objective was secured but the casualties listing included 13 officers and 307 men killed, wounded and missing. After a spell in reserve John moved up to Ypres on 29 August 1917 to take part in the Battle of Passchendaele. They were also in the trenches at Polygon Wood. In November 1917 they were back in reserve at Eblinghem where they were visited by HM the King of the Belgians. At some stage during the war John was wounded and lost his leg.

Private 24860 Arthur Henry Taylor Royal Fusiliers who died in 1978.

Private Arthur Henry Taylor also served with the Royal Fusiliers. His service records show he enlisted on 11 January 1915. His nickname was ‘Lucky’ but his records show he was wounded and suffered the effects of a gas attack, before being wounded again in March 1917. Arthur also suffered from rheumatism and frost bite.

The number of sick and wounded treated in Malta from May 1915 up to February 1919 was around 58,000 from the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force, and 78,000, from the Salonika Expeditionary Force. In July 1915, after a period of very hard work, the ground being exceedingly uneven and rocky, St David’s Camp Hospital in Malta was ready to receive nearly 500 patients; in August it was fully equipped for 1,000 beds. The cases received were at first mild surgical and convalescents. As with the other hospital camps in Malta, St David’s was soon busy with the ever-increasing stream of dysentery and enteric casualties. Arthur’s Christmas card shows he was at St David’s for Christmas 1915.

Arthur’s pay book with a bullet hole in it. He told his family it was his pay book and cigarette tin that saved his life.

Help the Wounded Postcard to highlight the work in Malta.

The faded Christmas card Arthur Taylor sent home to Leatherhead from St David’s hospital in Malta.

Vera Brittain (third from the left) with fellow VAD nurses on Malta 1916, a year after Arthur was nursed back to health on the island. (Vera Brittain Estate, McMaster University Library)

Newspaper announcement about the loss of the Taylor brothers.

Arthur on his 90th Birthday.

He returned to Leatherhead after the war and, like his parents, he went on to have a large family of thirteen children. On Arthur’s 90th birthday the local papers ran an article in which was mentioned his participation in the building of the Crescent Cinema (Thorndike), Leatherhead Hospital and the Post Office. ‘Taffer’, as he was affectionately known, had over 100 grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Many of his descendants were still living in the Leatherhead area. Despite all he suffered, Arthur went on to live in Leatherhead until his death in 1978. He was laid to rest in Randall’s Park Crematorium, the site of the training ground for the University and Public Schools Battalion in 1914.

Kingston Road in the early 1900s, home to the Taylor Family.

Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt (1877–1915)

Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt (1877-1915)

Mr Vanderbilt, the millionaire, had a coach and four which ran from London to Box Hill, stopping at the Swan in Leatherhead. This was after the regular coach service had ceased to run. At the next stop, the Running Horse at Mickleham, a small boy always came out to meet the coach, blowing a toy horn. Mr Vanderbilt had a small coach horn engraved for him as a surprise and presented it to him in a special case.

The RMS Lusitania was a British ocean liner, holder of the Blue Riband, and briefly the world’s largest passenger ship. She was launched by the Cunard Line in 1906, at a time of fierce competition for the North Atlantic trade. On 7 May 1915, she was torpedoed and sunk by a German U-boat, causing the deaths of 1,198 passengers and crew. Vanderbilt had witnessed the Lusitania complete her maiden voyage to New York in September of 1907. He was a frequent traveller and some years made as many as seven crossings between the UK and the United States.

Coach and horses outside the Swan Hotel. Horse and carriage racing was Vanderbilt’s passion. He was often seen in Leatherhead and enjoyed the refreshments offered at The Swan.

German notice to neutral America warning travellers against sailing across the Atlantic. The notice appeared in the New York Times.

Alfred Vanderbilt’s purpose in travelling on the Lusitania on her fateful voyage in May 1915 was to direct a meeting of the International Horse Breeders’ Association. The 1914 meeting had been cancelled due to the outbreak of war, but it was decided this year that there would be no cancellation. Alfred’s other purpose for travelling abroad was to return to England to offer a fleet of wagons and himself as driver to the Red Cross Society, for he said he felt every day that he was not doing enough. His wife Margaret and their two children decided to stay in New York City, in the Vanderbilt Hotel on Park Avenue. The night before sailing, Alfred and Margaret saw the Broadway play ‘A Celebrated Case’, coproduced by David Belasco and fellow Lusitania passenger Charles Frohman.

The morning of the sailing, a notice from the German Embassy appeared in the newspapers, warning Americans away from Allied ships. Vanderbilt and his wife just laughed the warning off. That same morning, a telegram arrived for Alfred, saying: ‘The Lusitania is doomed. Do not sail on her.’ The note was signed simply, Morte.

After the ship was torpedoed, Alfred and his valet Ronald Denyer calmly assisted several women and children to safety. Fellow passenger Oliver Bernard almost collided with Vanderbilt in the A Deck saloon class entrance. He was surprised by Vanderbilt’s composure, and would never forget the grin on the millionaire’s face. Alfred was heard remarking to another passenger, ‘Well, they got us this time, all right.’ On B Deck, Second Steward Robert Chisholm saw Vanderbilt ‘vainly attempting to rescue a hysterical woman.’ Chisholm shouted, ‘Hurry Mr. Vanderbilt, or it will be too late!’

Vanderbilt continued assisting women and children. Thomas Slidell saw him put a lifebelt on a woman’s shoulders and then walk away without saying a word. Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt, a renowned sportsman, did not know how to swim but even so made no attempt to push his way through the mad crowd and into a lifeboat. One of the last people to see him was Owen Kenan, on the port side near the Verandah Café. Owen jumped with Denyer at the last minute but Denyer drowned. Nurse Alice Middleton, a second cabin passenger, is thought to have accepted Vanderbilt’s offer of a lifebelt. Vanderbilt helped her put it on, but before he could finish securing it, the Lusitania took her final plunge and water enclosed them, separating the two.

A recruitment poster encourage men to enlis

The memorial to Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt on the A24 London to Worthing Road in Holmwood. The inscription reads, ‘In Memory of Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt a gallant gentleman and a fine sportsman who perished in the Lusitania May 7th 1915. This stone is erected on his favourite road by a few of his British coaching friends and admirers’. (‘Katherinesdad’ via Wikimedia)

Bernard Stenning and the Church Lads’ Brigade

Bernard Clement Stenning was born in Caterham in 1882, the son of Herbert Edward Stenning, a wealthy solicitor, and Louisa Fanny Thompson. The census of 1891 shows Bernard with his parents, older brothers Edward and Claude, older sister Mary, younger sister Agatha plus the family’s live-in cook, housemaid and groom all resident at a house called ‘Greenlands’ in Caterham.

The Stenning family moved to Leatherhead in 1895. Herbert, secretary of the Surrey Foxhounds and a prominent Freemason, swiftly settled into the community and won the Leatherhead Urban District Council elections in 1899 in the Conservative interest. To celebrate he decided to travel to the Channel Islands aboard the London and South Western Railway passenger ferry Stella on Maundy Thursday, 30 March 1899. Bernard was 17 when he heard his father had tragically died at the age of 55 in the English Channel, despite wearing a life jacket, when the Stella hit the Casquets reefs and sank in eight minutes, between Southampton and Guernsey.

Bernard Stenning’s notice advising local residents of the Leatherhead and District Commercial Association to which he belonged.

Adding to the family’s distress, Herbert’s body, according to the Surrey Mirror of 30 May 1899, was not found until the end of May in the sea off Wimereux. Herbert was buried in St Nicholas’ Parish Church on 27 May 1899. He was one of 105 passengers and crew to die in the disaster. The passenger lists do not show any other members of the Stenning family travelling on the ship.

The SS Stella which sank on 30 March 1899.

Forty bereaved families, including the Stennings, immediately brought actions for compensation. The LSWR tried to avoid their responsibilities and a number of widows and orphans ended up in the workhouse. Edward Stenning was more fortunate and employed an experienced QC and the family claim was paid in the sum of £6,200, plus costs. The compensation enabled Bernard’s brother Edward, in partnership with a Leatherhead’s local builder W.H. Brown, to purchase land to build the St Nicholas Hill development on the south side of Highlands Road in Leatherhead.

Until the claim was settled, the family experienced a period of relative hardship but by 1910 Louisa and four of her five children were able to move into the newly built Overdale, whilst Edward lived in Beechlands, Reigate Road. In partnership, following their father’s career path, Bernard and Edward ran a solicitor’s practice with offices in London and Bank Chambers, North Street, Leatherhead.

Bernard Stenning’s offices, above the Capital and County Banking Company seen on the left. (Leatherhead History Society Archive)

Bernard became captain of the Leatherhead company of the Church Lads’ Brigade Cadets in 1908. The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of 13 November 1915 reported the ninety-strong Sunday cadet parade, commanded by Bernard, to celebrate the twenty-third anniversary of the formation of the brigade. This was followed that week by a Drill Hall inspection, the first since the corps had khaki uniform, once again under the orders of Captain Stenning and complimented as being of ‘a very high standard’.

It cannot be underestimated the loss felt by the residents of Leatherhead when Bernard died. A relatively long obituary in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of August 1917 stated:

‘There must be few of us here this morning to whom the death of Bernard Stenning does not mean the loss of a personal friend. Having to work as hard as any man at his own profession, he has for many years given up almost every moment of his spare time to the services of others, and his aid was ever at the disposal of anyone who needed help of any sort. It is impossible to do justice in words to his constant readiness to do any possible act of kindness or to express what this place owes to his work and influence for good amongst the young, more especially in connection with All Saints’ Sunday School, the Church Lads’ Brigade and the Scouts… Words cannot tell how much he will be missed amongst us here.’

Whilst in the Army Bernard Stenning found himself at Talbot House (Toc H, a soldiers’ rest and recreation centre founded in December 1915 at Poperinghe, Belgium). It aimed to promote Christianity and was named in memory of Gilbert Talbot, son of Edward Talbot, then Bishop of Winchester, who had been killed at Hooge in July 1915. The founders were Gilbert’s elder brother Neville Talbot, then a senior army chaplain, and the Reverend Philip Thomas Byard (Tubby) Clayton. Talbot House was styled as an ‘Every Man’s Club’, where all soldiers were welcome, regardless of rank. It was ‘an alternative for the “debauched” recreational life of the town’. Stenning made quite an impression on Tubby Clayton for in the chapel, which is up a steep staircase and remains the same as it was then, there is a small pew with the inscription, ‘Pray for the soul of Bernard Stenning who received the sacrament in Talbot House chapel. He passed from War to Peace July 26, 1917,’ engraved on a plaque.

1911 Census return showing Bernard Stenning living in Leatherhead. (The National Archives, Kew)

The chapel at Talbot House, Poperinge. Tubby Clayton wrote in 1925 ‘To me there is but one road, and that — the road to Ypres. Literally millions went by this one way; and over a quarter of one million did not live to re-pass it homeward.’

Agatha Stenning, Bernard’s sister, leading the Girl Guides at the Peace Celebrations, 19 July 1919.

The Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser reported the sad news that Lieutenant Bernard C. Stenning had died of his wounds in July. It listed him as the youngest son of Mr A.E. Stenning and Mrs Stenning of Overdale, St Nicholas Hill, Leatherhead.

Bernard’s younger sister Agatha Emily Stenning, born in 1884, was photographed leading the Nightingale Girl Guides during the Leatherhead Peace celebrations on 19 July 1919, no doubt her brother was on her mind during the march. Agatha never married and stayed living at Overdale until her death in Leatherhead Hospital in October 1953. She is buried in St Mary and St Nicholas Church alongside her father, mother and sister.

Ada Elizabeth Weller and the Queen Mary’s Auxiliary Army Corps

The UK’s Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) of 1917–1918, was later named Queen Mary’s Army Auxiliary Corps (1918–1920). It was formally instituted on 7 July 1917 by Sir Nevil Macready, the adjutant general, who had appointed Dr Mona Chalmers Watson the first Chief Controller and senior officer. Over 57,000 women served between January 1917 and November 1918. On 31 March 1917 women in the WAAC were first sent to the battlefields in France, just fourteen cooks and waitresses. Helen Gwynne-Vaughan was the senior officer overseas, and Florence Leach was the controller of the cooks. The corps was disbanded in September 1921.

Recruitment poster for Queen Mary’s Army Auxiliary Corps.

Ada Elizabeth Weller, the daughter of William Weller, a housepainter, was born in Epsom on 23 February 1886 and lived in Gravel Hill, Leatherhead with her parents and ten siblings. Just before the war, the 1911 Census shows Ada living and working as a domestic cook at Park Rise, Leatherhead, home of the dental surgeons William Baily Peacock and his brother Henry Maurice Peacock. According to her army records, Ada passed her medical to join the Queen Mary’s Auxiliary Army Corps on 9 May 1918; she listed her home address as 3 Poplar Road, Leatherhead. Ada was officially appointed to the position of ‘waitress’ at their headquarters in London, The Connaught Club on 30 May 1918. Her next appointment was on 3 June 1918 when she was posted to Victoria, London serving the Anzacs. Sadly just weeks into her new role Ada was admitted to The London Hospital for Women in Clapham and died on 17 July 1918 of ‘double lobar pneumonia’. She was only 32 years old.

Waitresses of Queen Mary’s Auxiliary Army Corps. (National Army Museum Archive)

Influenza was commonly linked to pneumonia, suggesting Ada had died of the latest wave of Spanish Flu. In the spring of 1918, the virus emerged in pockets across the globe and at first seemed as benign as the common cold. Soldiers in the trenches in France became ill with what was known as la grippe. Sufferers complained of sore throats, headaches and a loss of appetite. Although the illness was highly infectious, and the primitive, crowded conditions made rapid spread inevitable, recovery was swift and doctors at first called it ‘three-day fever’. It was swiftly realised this was no ordinary flu.

Glasgow was the first British city to be affected, in May 1918, and within weeks the illness had spread south, reaching London, where Ada Weller was posted, by June. During the next few months, 228,000 people died in Britain. About a fifth of those infected developed pneumonia or septicaemia. Often this progressed to heliotrope cyanosis, a lavender hue of the skin that signalled shortage of oxygen and imminent death. Onset was devastatingly quick. Those hale and hearty at breakfast could be dead by tea-time.

Ada was buried in St Mary and St Nicholas Church. Her father signed for her War Plaque and certificate. The Commonwealth War Grave headstone would have been placed in St Mary and St Nicholas Church during the 1920s as Ada had died in service between 4 August 1914 and 31 August 1921. She is commemorated in Leatherhead Methodist Church in Church Road.

Ada Elizabeth Weller’s Commonwealth War Grave in St Mary and St Nicholas Churchyard.

Ada was not the only local person who died in service as a result of the Spanish Influenza. St Mary and St Nicholas Parish Churchyard also contains the graves of Corporal George W.C. Alexander of the Essex Regiment who died on 4 November 1918, and Private Ernest F Wright of the Norfolk Regiment who died on 30 October 1918.

Leatherhead’s VC Recipient Harold Auten

Harold Auten was born on 22 August 1891, the son of William Blee Auten of Plymouth, a retired naval paymaster, and Edith Fanny Mary, born in Dulwich. He was the eldest of four children, born whilst the family were resident at The Shrubberies in Church Street, Leatherhead, as was his brother Guy. The family were to move to Lewisham Hill and he was educated at Wilson’s School in Camberwell. At the age of 17 Auten was apprenticed to the P&O line and in 1910 joined the Royal Navy Reserve and was promoted to sub-lieutenant shortly before the outbreak of the war. The Q-ships he served on were designed to be decoy ships, disguised as an innocent merchant ship, to encourage the U-boats to surface. As soon as the U-boat surfaced the guns of the Q-ship opened to fire. The London Gazette issue of 6 April 1918 states he had already won the Distinguished Service Cross in 1917 for ‘services in Vessels of the Royal Navy employed on Patrol and Escort duty’.

Harold Auten VC, a resident of The Shrubberies, Church Street, Leatherhead in the 1890s.

The Digest of Citation for the Victoria Cross reads:

‘At 5pm on 30 July 1918 in the English Channel, Lieutenant Auten was in command of HMS Stock Force Q or “mystery” ships when she was torpedoed by U-boat 80 and very badly damaged. The “panic party” took to the boats and the U-boat surfaced half a mile away, but after fifteen minutes they began to row back, followed by U-boat 80. When it lay about 300 yards from the Stock Force the guns opened fire, doing tremendous damage to the submarine which sank in a very short time. HMS Stock Force finally sank under tow four hours later, Lieutenant Auten and her crew being taken off by a torpedo boat.’

The 360-ton HMS Stock Force was one of 200 Q-ships used during the First World War. Q-ships took their name from the home port of the earliest versions – Queenstown, today known as Cobh, in the Republic of Ireland. These ships had guns concealed under dummy lifeboats or hidden under fake funnels and awnings. HMS Stock Force was said to be twenty-five miles south west of Start Point in Cornwall when it was torpedoed. The torpedo hit a forward bulkhead seriously damaging it and the bridge. Auten remained on board with the gun and engine-room crews. The ‘panic party’, an extra crew on Q-ships created to give the impression to the enemy the ship had been abandoned, left in the boats. Acting as a decoy, the ‘panic party’ enticed the U-boats into the firing range of HMS Stock Force by rowing back towards the damaged ship. Auten held fire until the submarine was alongside, enabling him to engage with both guns at 5.40pm.

German U-boats in harbour.

The former collier HMS Stock Force.

The U-boat was hit three times; one torpedo took off the periscope, another the conning tower and a third smashed into the submarine’s hull with a force so strong it blew out a number of the crew. Such force meant the submarine subsided after which the Stock Force fired shell upon shell until the submarine sank by the stern. It was not until 9.25 pm that the Q-ship, still flying the White Ensign, sank. The crew of the Stock Force were rescued by two torpedo boats and a trawler. The 20 November 1918 edition of the London Gazette cited the incident as one of the ‘finest examples of coolness, discipline and good organisation in the history of ‘Q’ ships.’

Auten was presented with his medal by King George V on 18 September 1918 at Buckingham Palace; the band played ‘Hush, hush, hush! Here comes the Bogey Man’ greatly to the amusement of the King and the spectators. Once the war had ended he wrote Q Boat Adventures, the first ever book written about the ‘mystery ships’. By 1925 he was a lieutenant commander in the RNR and had begun working in the film industry on a film about the Battle of Mons and in 1928 released a silent film about Q-Ships in which Auten appeared as himself.

Harold Auten VC’s Book telling of his adventures during the war.

The Mauretania was taken out of service in 1934 and its bell is currently located in the reception of the Lloyds Registry of Shipping, Fenchurch Street, London. Annually for Remembrance Day, Lloyds Register observe two minutes of silence and lay a wreath at its base in honour of servicemen and women.

Auten moved to New York, travelling back and forth to the UK aboard RMS Mauretania, the sister ship to the torpedoed Lusitania, on a number of occasions. One such trip in 1929 was to attend a dinner, given by the Prince of Wales, at London’s Guildhall for Victoria Cross holders. Auten replied to the Prince’s speech on behalf of the naval VCs.

In the US Auten became an Executive Vice-President for the Rank Corporation, owned a hotel, cinema and antique shop. He remained a member of the Royal Navy Reserves and in 1941 was awarded the RNR Officer’s Decoration. During World War Two he held the rank of commander and acting captain and organised trans-Atlantic convoys. For his ‘distinguished service to the Allied cause throughout the war’ he was made an Officer of the United States Legion of Merit

Sadly, owing to investment problems, Auten died penniless in Bushkill, Pennsylvania on 3 October 1964. He was buried in an unmarked grave in Sandhill Cemetery, Bushkill until the publication in 1999 of David Harvey’s Monuments to Courage, which inspired the residents of Bushkill to mark the grave in recognition of his bravery and achievements.

The Victoria Cross.

Distinguished Service Cross.

Commander of the Order of Orange-Nassau.

Officer of the United States Legion of Merit.

Harold Auten’s photograph from his Merchant Seaman’s Records. (The National Archives)

The final resting place of HMS Stock Force was unknown because official charts had placed it in the wrong location. More than ninety years after it sank, the wreck has been located by Steven Mortimer and a team of divers, eight miles from where the charts said it was, at a depth of 200 feet and 14 miles from Plymouth.

As part of the government’s First World War Centenary campaign during 2014-18, commemorative paving stones will be laid at the birthplaces of Victoria Cross recipients of the First World War, including one in Leatherhead to recognise Harold Auten.

Newspaper announcement of Harold Auten’s award of the Victoria Cross.

Peace Celebrations

The government’s Peace Committee met for the first time on 9 May 1919. They outlined a celebration running over four days, including a victory march through London, a day of thanksgiving services, a river pageant and a day of popular festivities. The Peace March was one of the most impressive spectacles ever witnessed by Londoners and the world. Nearly 15,000 troops took part, led by the victorious Allied commanders. On the morning of 19 July King George V issued a message to the wounded soldiers,

‘To these, the sick and wounded who cannot take part in the festival of victory, I send our greetings and bid them good cheer, assuring them that the wounds and scars so honourable in themselves, inspire in the hearts of their fellow countrymen the warmest feelings of gratitude and respect.’

Harry Nathan Bridger (left) of Randalls Park Gardens, a private in the Hon. Artillery Company who was gassed and lost three fingers and the sight of one eye in 1917. He was one of many of Leatherhead’s wounded who returned from the war.

19 July 1919 Peace Celebrations in Leatherhead.

Residents in Leatherhead’s North Street awaiting the Peace Day Procession, 19 July 1919.

The Leatherhead Fire Brigade marching in the Peace Celebration Procession, 19 July 1919.

Leatherhead joined with the nation by having its own Peace March on 19 July 1919. A grand lunch was given for 350 returning servicemen at St John’s School and then a procession of over 2,000 people was led by the Reverend Hobson and Mr T.J. Leavey, the council chairman, to Randalls Park for sports, dancing and a tea party. At dusk the silver band led a further procession to Yarm Court for fireworks and a bonfire.

Leatherhead’s postman returns

Archie Eric Briscoe was born on 3 September 1883 in Long Crendon in Buckinghamshire but came to live in Leatherhead when he was appointed as the local postman. In 1904 the baptism registers show Archie was baptised at All Saints Church, Leatherhead. His occupation is shown as postman and his mother, Fanny is added to the register but not his father. In 1912 the electoral register shows Archie was living at Park Villa, Kingston Road with a Mrs Jones, who was most likely his landlady.

Between the years 1907 and the beginning of the war Archie is shown as a very active member of the community; he wins first prize in a whist tournament, plays cricket for the Leatherhead Post Office team, is on the committee for the Leatherhead National Deposit Society and attains his St John’s ambulance certificate.

Aged 32, Archie Briscoe attested for military service with the Royal Field Artillery on 8 December 1915 but was not mobilized until 24 March 1916 at which time he joins the 147th Brigade of the Royal Field Artillery which became part of the 29th Division, and had just returned from the fighting in Gallipoli. Archie would have most likely seen action with this division on the Somme, during the Arras Offensive, the Third Battle of Ypres and the Final Advance in Flanders.

Archie’s service records, which survived the archive fires during the Second World War, list ‘15 December 1916 leave to UK with ration allowance’. Records show Archie headed to the Parish Church in Wantage, Oxfordshire where he married Isabell Carver on Boxing Day 1916. After a short honeymoon Archie returned to the battalion in France on 4 January 1917. During his time in the Army Archie registered his home address as Umballa, Kingston Road, Leatherhead which he returned to in 1919, having reached the army dispersal centre on 20 February 1919.

Archie Briscoe one of Leatherhead’s postmen before the war.

Leatherhead’s returning soldiers marching in the 19 July 1919 Peace Celebration Procession.

Leatherhead post office workers before the war. Archie Briscoe pictured on the top left hand corner.

Post office workers marching in the 19 July 1919 Peace Celebration Procession.

Church Lads’ Brigade pause for a moment’s silence during the Peace Day Celebrations July 1919.

Returning soldiers marching in the Peace Celebration Procession, 19 July 1919.

A sad footnote to the Peace Day Celebrations as the £8 profit was stolen. (DLA 27 August 1919)

The Sons of Leatherhead War Memorial

The war memorial to the Sons of Leatherhead was unveiled and dedicated on 3 April 1921. The memorial design was an arcade facing a terrace. On the terrace there is a cross inlaid with a bronze crusader sword. On the wall beneath the arcade stands a series of ten tablets inscribed with the names of those who had died. The report in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser of Saturday, 9 April 1921 called the memorial ‘imposing’ and its opening attracted a large crowd, estimated to be between a quarter and a third of the population of Leatherhead. After the Last Post was sounded a service followed, the silver band played and finally the National Anthem was sung.

The land was given and the memorial sponsored by Mr C.F. Leach of Vale Lodge, Leatherhead whose son, Grey De Lèche Leach, a second lieutenant with the Scots Guards had been killed. Mr Leach was on the committee that organised the memorial.

Correspondence of the Leatherhead Memorial Committee.

Site of the Leatherhead War Memorial before the War.

The War Memorial today.

The War Memorial in the 1920s.

The unveiling and dedication service of the Leatherhead War Memorial, Sunday 3 April 1921.

The Cross in the Tower

A wooden cross hangs on the wall of St Mary and St Nicholas Church, Leatherhead. The cross shows the metal inscription plates of ‘510102 Pte. F.C.B. Coward’. Before being replaced with the Portland stone standard Commonwealth War gravestone, this cross marked the grave of Private Francis Charles Brockett Coward, A Company, 1st/14th Battalion of the London (Scottish) Regiment who is buried in the Honourable Artillery Company Cemetery at Écoust St Mein, in the Pas de Calais. Francis died in the closing months of the war on 29 August 1918, aged 26.

War Medal Index Card for Private Francis Coward. (The National Archives, Kew)

The London Scottish in battle.

Agnes Coward (nee Brockett), Francis’s mother, a charwoman, lived in Church Street Leatherhead. His father, Samson Coward, a kennel keeper at Cobham Court, had died in 1896 aged 35, only four years after his son’s birth, and was buried in St Mary and St Nicholas Church. As a widow Agnes had been left to raise her three daughters and one son alone.

Francis’s war medal roll shows he had seen active service overseas between 15 September 1914 and 19 January 1915 and between 3 November 1917 and the date of his death in action in August 1918. He was the bugler of the 1/14th County of London Battalion (London Scottish). These service dates suggest that he had been wounded or taken ill between the end of January 1915 and November 1917. Francis was posthumously awarded the 1914 Star Medal when it was established in 1917. Also known as ‘Pip’ or the Mons Star, this bronze medal was authorized by King George V in April 1917 for those who had served in France or Belgium during 5 August 1914 to midnight on 22 November 1914 inclusive. The award was open to officers and men of the British and Indian Expeditionary Forces, doctors and nurses as well as Royal Navy, Royal Marines, Royal Navy Reserve and Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve who served ashore with the Royal Naval Division in France or Belgium. A narrow horizontal bronze clasp sewn onto the ribbon, bearing the dates ‘5th AUG. – 22nd NOV. 1914’ shows that the recipient had actually served under fire by the enemy during that period. For every seven medals issued without a clasp there were approximately five issued with the clasp. Initially Francis’s war medals were issued without the clasp but on 20 June 1920 Agnes applied for her son’s medals to be issued with a clasp and the application was accepted and posted to her address, now 1 Pembury Grove, Lower Clapton, London. It is highly likely Agnes was also responsible for bringing back Francis’s wooden grave marker from Calais and placing it in St Mary and St Nicholas Church, close to the final resting place of her late husband.

The grave marker of Private Francis Coward hung in St Mary and St Nicholas Parish Church. (Liam Sumption and Leatherhead History Society)

The Loss of the Brave – Grey de Lèche Leach

Grey De Lèche Leach was born in Streatham in 1894. He was a member of the Church Lads’ Brigade in Leatherhead and the 1911 Census shows at that aged 17 he was at Uppingham School. Grey enlisted in the 1/5 East Surrey Regiment, the local Territorial unit, on 10 August 1914, six days after the outbreak of war. He was posted overseas with his unit on 29 October 1914 and proceeded to India where the Territorial Force was relieving the peacetime Regulars. Between 4 December 1914 and 20 August 1915 he was stationed in Cawnpore in Central India and then Nowshera until October 1915. On 4 December 1915 he transferred to the Scots Guards Special Reserve of officers on probation and from that date until 31 March 1916 he was attached to the Regiment’s 3rd (Reserve) Battalion. On 1 April 1916 he went to France to join the 1st Battalion Scots Guards which had formed part of the British Expeditionary Force since the commencement of hostilities. He served with them until the fatal events of 3 September 1916, having been promoted to second lieutenant on 5 June 1916.

Second Lieutenant Grey de Lèche Leach.

The war diary for the 1st Battalion Scots Guards states:

‘A very sad accident attended by fatal results occurred this morning. 2nd Lt G. de L. Leach, the Battalion Bombing Officer, was detonating bombs in the Orderly Room when the fuse of one accidentally ignited. Realising the great danger in which this placed the other two occupants of the Orderly Room, Lt Leach, after shouting a warning to them rushed to the door evidently with the intention of throwing the bomb into some bushes. On reaching the door however, he observed a number of people in the vicinity and before he could throw the bomb clear it exploded, blowing off both his hands and wounding him in the stomach and legs. He was conveyed to hospital at Corbie with all possible speed, but died before it was reached. By his unselfish action he saved the lives of several others, but lost his own. A Court of Enquiry was held in the evening and a suitable notice was recorded.’

The diary also poignantly included an account of his burial the next day with the commanding officer, second in command, the majority of the officers, twenty-four other ranks and the pipes and drums present.

Grey De Lèche Leach was interred in the Corbie Communal Cemetery Extension in France. His courage was recognised on 11 December 1917, when the London Gazette announced that the King had awarded Grey the Albert Medal in Gold as recognition of his conspicuous self-sacrifice. The Gazette’s account read:

The marble tablet in memory of Grey de Lèche Leach, placed in the Leatherhead Parish Church by Mr and Mrs D.F. Leach of Vale Lodge, Leatherhead in memory of their son. (Liam Sumption, Leatherhead War Memorials and Leatherhead History Society)

Newspaper article about the loss of Grey De Lèche Leach.

‘In France on 3 September 1916 Lieutenant Leach was examining bombs in a building in which two non-commissioned officers were also at work, when the fuse of one of the bombs ignited. Shouting a warning he made for the door carrying the bomb pressed close to his body, but on reaching the door he found other men outside so that he could not throw the bomb away without exposing others to grave danger. He continued therefore to press the bomb to his body until it exploded, mortally wounding him. Lieutenant Leach might easily have saved his life by throwing the bomb away or dropping it on the ground and seeking shelter, but either course would have endangered the lives of those in or around the building. He sacrificed himself for the lives of others.’

The Cenotaph Memorial Whitehall

The Cenotaph memorial in Whitehall was unveiled by King George V on 11 November 1920, the second anniversary of the Armistice with Germany which ended the First World War. It was decided not to dedicate the memorial, as not all the dead it commemorates are Christian. The unveiling ceremony for the Cenotaph was part of a larger procession bringing the Unknown Warrior to be laid to rest in his tomb located nearby in Westminster Abbey. The funeral procession route passed the Cenotaph, where the waiting King laid a wreath on the Unknown Warrior’s gun carriage before proceeding to unveil the memorial which was draped in large Union Flags.

The Cenotaph memorial in Whitehall unveiled by King George V on 11 November 1920.

Sidney Dench was born in Leatherhead in August 1902, the son of a gardener who, according to the 1911 Census, was living at 2 Ivy Cottages, Highlands Road. The 18-year-old Sidney was chosen as one of the firing party at the Cenotaph during the inauguration ceremony for the Unknown Warrior.

Field Marshal Douglas Haig, first Earl Haig, and Field Marshal John French, first Earl of Ypres, walked beside the coffin of the Unknown Warrior as it was carried in procession from Victoria station to the Cenotaph. King George V placed a wreath on the coffin of the unknown warrior after it arrived at the Cenotaph.

Many of the men returning from the war found employment with Leatherhead company W.H. Browns building staff in the 1920s.

Victory had not been cheap; John Maynard Keynes, the economist, estimated the damage sustained by Britain was at least £570 million. The number of military dead was approximately 722,000 of whom 39 per cent were between the ages of 20 and 24. The rituals of remembrance became familiar well into the 1930s and beyond. Leatherhead would come to a complete standstill on 11 November at 11, o’clock for decades; initially women openly wept in the streets on this occasion.

The Memorial Plaque, often known as ‘Dead Man’s Penny’ was issued after the First World War to the next-of-kin of all British and Empire service personnel who were killed as a result of the war. The 1,355,000 were issued to commemorate the people who died as a consequence of the war.

Many of the charities vital for the war effort continued to thrive. HRH Princess Mary inspecting the Leatherhead VADs at Denbies, 12 July 1931. One of the banners reads ‘Peace – Still Serving’.

The Junior Red Cross at 12 The Crescent, Leatherhead in the 1920s after winning the Silver Cup.

The population had grown between 1911 and the next census of 1921, although it was at a slower rate than between 1901 and 1911. The overall health of children had improved during the war as they were generally better fed and clothed. Most of the wartime controls were to disappear and many of the women who had entered into employment during the war now returned to the home. Despite all the lessons learnt during 1914-18, war came once again to Leatherhead in 1939.

New Year’s Day 1921 – Leatherhead residents looking forward to a brighter future.

Bibliography

Publications

Anon, The History of the Royal Fusiliers ‘U.P.S’ University and Public Schools Brigade (Formation and Training), The Times, Foreword by the Hon. Arthur Stanley CB MVO MP

Atherton, K., Dorking in the Great War, Pen & Sword. 2015

Auten, Harold, Q-Boat Adventures. 1919

Beckett, Ian, Home Front 1914-1918. How Britain Survived the Great War, The National Archives, 2006.

Edmonds, J.E. & Wynne, G.C., Military Operations France and Belgium, 1915: Winter 1915: Battle of Neuve Chapelle: Battles of Ypres. History of the Great War Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence I, Macmillan. 1995

Edwards, Nina, Dressed For War. Uniform and Civilian Clothing and Trappings, 1914-1918, I.B. Taurus, 2015

Ginger. A.J., Leatherhead in Victorian Times – Leatherhead Proceedings, (1953) Proceedings Vol 1, No 7.

Harvey, David, (1999) Monuments to Courage: Victoria Cross Headstones and Memorials. Vol.1, 1854–1916, Kevin & Kay Patience

Heath, Linda and Tarplee, Peter, Then and Now Leatherhead & District, Tempus Publishing Limited, (2005)

Hurwitz, Samuel J (1949). State Intervention in Great Britain: Study of Economic Control and Social Response, 1914–1919, Routledge

Parishes: Leatherhead, in A History of the County of Surrey: Volume 3, ed. H.E. Malden (1911), pp. 293-301

Paxman, Jeremy, Great Britain’s Great War, Penguin, 2013.

Tarplee, Peter, Past Industries of Ashtead, Leatherhead and Bookham, Leatherhead & District Local History Society, 2010

Vardey, Edwina, History of Leatherhead A Town at the Crossroads, Leatherhead and District Local History Society, 1988

Williams, E.M.P., Williams, The Quest Goes On – Being a Short History of the First Hundred Years of St John’s School Leatherhead, 1851-1951, St John’s School, 1951

Primary Sources

Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser 1914-19

Leatherhead History Society Archive & Museum

Leatherhead Parish Magazines 1914-20

Websites

https://firstworldwarhiddenhistory.wordpress.com/2015/04/30/lusitania-2-ocean-liner-or-warship/

www.leatherheadweb.org.uk/warmemorials

www.leatherheadlocalhistory.org.uk

www.redcross.org.uk/About-us/Who-we-are/History-and-origin/First-World-War/Auxiliary-Hospitals

www.rmslusitania.info/people/saloon/alfred-vanderbilt/

www.uboat.net

www.worldwar1postcards.com/real-photographic-ww1-postcards.php