Current Information:

Age-20

Born-West Ham

Point 110 Old Military Cemetery, Fricourt, France

The 11th Royal Fusiliers battalion arrived in France in July, 1915, as part of 54 Brigade, 18th Division. They moved south to the Somme, a sector that had only recently been taken over from the French Army by the British, where they undertook trench instruction near the villages of Suzanne and Bray. On 24th August, 11th Royal Fusiliers marched back to billets in Dernancourt from where, on 4th September, they moved into the front line at Fricourt. During the night of 7/8th September, a mine was exploded in no-man’s-land in front of them and the line of their trench was successfully advanced to the edge of the newly formed crater. However this success did not come without a price and there were some casualties for the battalion. One of these was Arthur Parish.