Current Information:

Age-42

50, Cromer Street, Bloomsbury

28th Division did not reach France until January 1915, having been in India at the start of the war. They were immediately thrown into front line action which depleted their ranks substantially but it was winter diseases, among men fresh from the heat of India that seriously reduced their numbers. So badly did this affect them that in mid February, 85 Brigade was temporarily transferred to 3rd Division while 9 Brigade joined 28th Division. By early April, 1915, 85 Brigade was back with 28th Division at Zonnebeke in the Ypres salient and on 3rd April the 3rd Middlesex battalion moved into the trenches around Rosendal chateau, the present site of Bedford House Cemetery, where they remained until relieved on 6th April. On 10th April they marched to Zonnebeke in the northern part of the Ypres salient where they took over trenches from French troops and remained there until relieved on 12th April. At this point of the line the enemy had sapped to within seven yards of the battalion’s line and an urgent request for ‘jam-pot’ bombs to be sent up was made to try to deal with this threat.

William Buckley was killed on 12th April but the battalion diary provides 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.