Current Information:

Age-21

144, Millfields Road, Clapton

Rue-Petillon Military Cemetery, Fleurbaix, France

At the start of the war the 2nd Lincolnshire battalion were in Bermuda but they soon returned to England where they joined 25 Brigade of 8th Division. The division landed in France on 6th November, 1914 and spent the rest of the year either in the front line or in billets in and around Laventie in France. On 26th December they moved into trenches at Fauquissart where they remained until relieved on 29th December, the day on which Matthew McGeehan was killed but there is no further information concerning his death. The attrition rate among British soldiers on the Western Front was on average 300 each day and 60% of these were as a result of shellfire. When not involved in an actual battle it was either shell fire or a sniper’s bullet that caused most deaths and injuries.