Denby and District in the First and Second World Wars: Their Ultimate Sacrifice

By Chris Heath

Denby & District in the First and Second World Wars: Their Ultimate Sacrifice, commemorates and celebrates the lives of the soldiers from this part of the world and the role they played during hostilities. For the vast number of people the local War Memorial is something taken for granted, it has always been there and though it is respected it is not really understood anymore. The names upon it might be familiar to some but the lives and stories behind those names have largely been forgotten. The same is true of the local War graves in the churchyards. Interest sometimes peaks when a major anniversary occurs or a new film such as the recent ‘1917’ is released but this generally wanes after a while. This book provides a unique and timeless insight into our knowledge of the men of Denby Dale, Upper & Lower Cumberworth, Birdsedge, Upper & Lower Denby and Ingbirchworth and throws up many surprises. The soldier’s families are examined in detail, their civilian occupations, their homes and achievements. Their War service histories, where they fought, how they died and where they are buried are included where those records have survived. It is not just the fallen contained in these pages and the stories of many who returned from the arena of the two World Wars are printed here for the very first time. With 130 illustrations and 30 family tree’s this book is a tribute to all those that made the Ultimate Sacrifice and their comrades in arms who made it home.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Jun 16, 2022
• ISBN: 9781399099646

Chris Heath

Chris Heath is the best-selling and award- winning author of the Pet Shop Boys’ Literally as well as Robbie Williams’ previous biography, Feel. After starting out at the music magazine Smash Hits in its 1980s heyday, Chris regularly contributed to The Face, Details, the Telegraph Magazine and Rolling Stone. For the last decade he has been writing longform non-fiction reportage for GQ in America – in 2013 he won a National Magazine Award for Reporting – whilst also continuing to interview politicians and celebrities to great acclaim.

Book preview

Introduction

‘There died that day … the finest flower of French chivalry.’

The Battle of Poitiers, 1356.

World history has been dominated by battles and wars, every generation has experienced them. British history is no different. These islands were invaded and conquered by the Romans, after their withdrawal the Irish, Picts, Saxons, Angles and Jutes fought for land and power with the indigenous Britons. Viking raids followed leading to a partial conquest, and then total conquest was achieved by the Normans. Internal strife and foreign conquest followed, wars on land and at sea with the French and Spanish and eventually an all out Civil War changing the country forever. Colonial wars were fought abroad as the British Empire expanded, in America, India and Africa, and more wars with the French Empire during Napoleonic times. Further strife with the Boer and Crimean Wars followed but as the twentieth century began, no one knew or had ever experienced the scale of loss that was to come in the shape of the First World War.

Around 65 million troops fought around the world, 5 million were British.

8½ million troops were killed including 750,000 British servicemen.

21 million were wounded including 1½ million British troops.

An estimated 2 million soldiers, sailors and airmen died from disease, malnutrition and other causes.

An estimated 13 million civilians were also killed.

The flower of British chivalry and youth were cut down in such numbers that they would have staggered those who fought at Poitiers. The War to end all Wars …

Disputes largely left unsettled at the end of the First World War gradually rankled and led to the unthinkable; a Second World War was to follow after a twenty-year hiatus, this was to become the deadliest military conflict in history.

72½ million people died as a result of the war.

24 million soldiers, sailors and airmen were killed in action.

Over 20 million people died as a result of disease and famine.

34 million civilians perished during the war.

6 million Jews were persecuted and lost their lives.

These conflicts impacted on every community in Britain and the sons of the Parish of Denby played their part as did their neighbours in Denby Dale, Skelmanthorpe, Penistone and indeed every hamlet, village, town and city up and down the country. Mothers, wives, lovers, sons and daughters were left to mourn the passing of those who never returned home having paid the ultimate sacrifice. This is not to say that many of those in the conflict did not make it back, the local war memorials record only the dead. Large numbers of veterans joined the local branches of the Royal British Legion; a glance at the records from Denby Dale shows over 200 members for 1946. Many of these told stories of great courage and comradeship; others never spoke of their experiences.

The fallen of Denby were, in most part, the sons of farmers and weavers, blacksmiths, carpenters and butchers. Ordinary men, in or around their early twenties, at the beginning of their careers, some newly married, many single with sweethearts, optimistic about their potential in life as people of this age generally are. They joined the armies of Britain because they believed that the cause was just, unaware of the horrors that awaited them. Information about them varies greatly, for some we know the circumstances of their death, for others, their death is about all we know. Their backgrounds are covered in as much detail as possible in order to know where they came from and what made them who they were. This is an attempt to make them more than words carved on to a family grave in the local churchyard or on war memorials, and to honour them for giving their lives so that ours could be lived to the full in more peaceful times.

I have omitted previously published details regarding both world wars in order to avoid repetition. The story of the foundation and operations of the Denby Dale branch of the British Legion, the war stories of John Gaunt, Leslie Shaw and Joe Price, the story of the two Denby Dale women who joined the Land Army and the conversion of the Victoria Memorial Hall in Denby Dale to a military hospital can all be found in previous volumes, along with much more.

It should be noted that some individuals are remembered on more than one monument in more than one place. In the case of the Birdsedge soldiers during the First World War the names of some of the fallen appear on the Denby Dale war memorial as well as on the Birdsedge Village Hall memorial. For no other reason than I researched the Denby Dale War memorial first, their names are recorded in that section. There are also instances of siblings joining up to fight and I have tended to record these together rather than repeat their family history.

I must also acknowledge the work of the late Margaret Stansfield whose book, Huddersfield’s Roll of Honour (2014), is an excellent starting place for any historian with an interest in the district’s First World War history. This, coupled with the Ancestry and Find My Past websites, enables at least a paragraph or two to be compiled. Due to the fact that the storage facility housing First World War service records was hit by a German bombing raid in the Second World War only forty per cent of these documents have survived into the twenty-first century, often referred to as ‘the burnt series’, much detail has been lost. It must also be said that due to data protection laws, the records of servicemen and women who served after 1920 (including the Second World War) are not readily accessible yet. I have included very brief details of two of my own family members in the final appendix, but I do not know their service histories and sadly there is no one left to ask now. Only the passage of time will see these records become available and it will be for future historians to update their stories.

This book has been researched and written during a national lockdown due to the Covid–19 pandemic. This has meant that the usual channels of investigation have been impossible to follow, yet the results due to my own archive and that miracle of our age, the internet, have seen largely positive results. I would like to believe that much more evidence has survived from the two world wars in terms of memory and photographs in private collections and sincerely hope that individuals will come forward to enhance any future reprint of this work. There were also people I have researched whose stories are not included due to a paucity of information. For example, I knew the late Jim Barber of Upper Denby, former publican and someone I called a friend, who aided and abetted my research for previous books. I can berate myself as long as I like for not asking him about his war service as he is sadly no longer with us. Records will eventually be released allowing us to discover more, but a person’s absence from these pages is no reflection on their accomplishments and is, almost, purely due to the Data Protection Act. Oh to be able to go back to when I first began asking questions. Speaking of the current pandemic, as I write more than four million people worldwide have tragically died throughout its duration. Millions more have suffered with its symptoms and countless masses have self-isolated, missing family and friends, international travel is all but halted, any plans that were made are all on hold, holidays are nothing but memories – and even Hitler didn’t shut the pubs. Yet. The same spirit that brought our ancestors through the two worst conflicts in human history still survives. Perhaps, when things return to normal, or as normal as can be, we will all have had time for thought and reflection and we will all embrace the present and the future with a zeal hitherto unknown and care about the past with a passion for what our forebears endured on our behalf.

Finally, if there are readers of this book with details or photographs of any individuals mentioned herein that would add to any potential reprint of this work then I would be delighted to hear from them at [e-mail].

Historical Note 1: A number of the soldiers featured in this book are listed as of the Parish of Fulstone. Historically Fulstone was a township in the Parish of Kirkburton, which included New Mill and Scholes, which, together with six other townships, formed the Graveship of Holme. It stretched as far as Jackson Bridge in the west to Lane Head, Shepley in the east and as far south as Broadstone Reservoir. At its eastern side it followed the Dearne Dike Road just to the west of Birdsedge, which is why a number of soldiers can be found residing at Fulstone when in fact they were living in the eastern part of Fulstone Parish but their nearest village was Birdsedge, hence their commemoration on the village war memorial.

Historical Note 2: Within the pages of this book I have had cause to mention Denby Delf which can also be spelt Delph. I have opted to use the former spelling which is an old English word for a stone or clay quarry. The Delph spelling has Scottish roots, though the two were interchangeable in old records and both are similarly still in use today.

For the Fallen

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,

England mourns for her dead across the sea.

Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,

Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal

Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,

There is music in the midst of desolation

And a glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,

Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.

They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;

They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;

They sit no more at familiar tables of home;

They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;

They sleep beyond England’s foam.

But where our desires are and our hopes profound,

Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,

To the innermost heart of their own land they are known

As the stars are known to the Night;

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,

Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;

As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,

To the end, to the end, they remain.

By Laurence Binyon

The Fallen of Upper Denby Parish

First World War

Private Charles Kilner Barraclough

Born – Upper Denby, 18 May 1883.

Died – Passchendaele, 8 October 1917.

Regimental No.103293.

Charles Kilner Barraclough was born into an old Denby family of farmers, butchers and blacksmiths. The family as we currently have it begins with James Barraclough, also written Barrowclough (1712–1782), who was born at Shepley and married Barbara Berry (1708–1781). They had a son, James (1730–1813) who married Ann Haigh and