Current Information:

Age-21

71, Sellons Avenue, Harlesden

Regina Trench Cemetery, Grandcourt, France

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

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

Most of the fighting during October, 1916, took place on the southern part of the battlefield where the Fourth Army struggled to capture Le Transloy Ridge. Further north, the Reserve Army were mainly concerned with holding the line but more and more, they too became involved in the struggle to push the enemy back from some of the commanding positions they had held since July 1st. Their main focus was the River Ancre valley and the Ancre Heights and on 21st October, 1916, a successful operation was launched against the German defences here when II Corps attacked Regina and Stuff Trenches on a 5000 yard front. Zero was at 12.06pm when 4th Canadian, 18th, 25th & 39th Divisions attacked behind an excellent artillery barrage which dealt with the wire entanglements. The 10th Essex and 8th Norfolk battalions of  53 Brigade, 18th Division took part in this operation and after some sharp fighting achieved their objectives, part of Stuff Trench. At one stage 8th Norfolk were engaged in a bombing (grenade) struggle near the Courcelette-Grandcourt road but eventually were unable to overcome German resistance there. However this success did not come without a price and there were many casualties suffered by the assaulting battalions. One of these was James Stevenson of 8th Norfolk who was killed in action.