Current Information:

Age-26

6, Glengall Road, Cubitt Town

Mons (Bergen) Communal Cemetery, Belgium

The Battle of Mons  August 23, 1914

This was the first battle fought by the British Army (BEF) in the war. Since landing in France ten days earlier the four infantry divisions and five cavalry brigades of the BEF had advanced to a position on the left flank of the French Armies only to find themselves directly in the line of the advance of the German First Army as they swept through Belgium and headed for Paris.

With orders to hold the German advance for 24 hours and outnumbered two to one, the BEF dug in along the Mons-Conde canal. The battle commenced at 9 am and lasted all day. By nightfall the BEF had withdrawn to the Valenciennes-Maubeuge road, a position from which the Great Retreat began the next day. British casualties, killed, wounded or missing, amounted to 1600 for the battle. German casualties were higher.

The 1st Royal West Kent battalion of 13 Brigade, 5th Division saw action at Mons after which they, along with the rest of the BEF, retreated south nearly 200 miles back to the River Marne which they reached on 5th September. Harold Gibson died from wounds on 9th September but as he is buried in a cemetery in Mons it seems likely that he was wounded during that battle and died some two weeks later while a prisoner of war.