Current Information:

Born-Willesden

Vailly British Cemetery, France

The Battle of the Aisne 13 September -28 September, 1914

After the Germans were defeated on the Marne they fell back to the River Aisne, closely pursued by both the British and the French. The new German line was a very formidable defensive position. To attack it  meant  having to cross the Aisne and then climb up a 500 foot high ridge on top of which was the Chemin des Dames, a road that gave the Germans an easy way to move troops along the top of the hills. On 13th September the Aisne was crossed by both British and French troops but after that progress became slower, until there was no progress at all. Both sides dug in and the fighting settled down into trench warfare. The fighting on the Aisne continued for two weeks at the end of which both sides realised that frontal attacks on entrenched positions were both costly and non-productive, not that this deterred them from continuing with this tactic throughout the war.

On 3rd October, 1914, 2nd Oxford & Bucks Light Infantry of 5 Brigade, 2nd Division, were at La Cour de Soupir, a farm with a stone quarry nearby and a place they had recently returned to having been involved in a lot of fighting there in mid-September. During the day there was some very accurate shelling of their positions especially on one particular trench held by the company on the right and three men were killed. One of these was Sidney Little.