Albany was born on the 18th April 1882 to Robert Scott and Elizabeth Bridgwood in Bradford, Yorkshire and was 32 years old when war broke out. He was married to his wife Mary Ascough, had two young children, son Kenneth and daughter Olive. He had a job as an estate gardener and lived in a tied cottage in Snainton, Yorkshire. He enlisted in Scarborough and it is unclear why he joined the war effort with the Territorial Force but it was said he was not a drinker and had numerous Temperance Medals to prove so!
He began his military career as a member of the Territorial Force with the service number 5506. His medal roll adds that he was in both the 6th and then the 5th Battalions of the Yorkshire Regiment, before he was transferred into the 2nd Battalion Yorkshire Regiment in 1916, with a new service number of 242699, possibly first seeing action at the southern end of the British Somme offensive line and at the battle of Transloy Ridges, in October 1916.
During this time period he came home wounded, was allowed to recuperate, and once he was fit, he returned back to the front line in early 1917. During the German Spring Offensive of 1918, the Germans grouped in thick fog and overran the trenches where Albany was fighting and took him, along with many others, prisoner on March 22nd. Unfortunately a shell exploded nearby and captors and captured alike were killed. He was 4 weeks short of his 37th birthday, leaving behind his family and quite a legacy…
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Arthur Selwyn Morley
Information submitted by Mrs Drury of Richmond. Arthur Selwyn Morley MC was one of nine children of a Weardale hill farmer who sold up in 1894 and moved to Houghton-le-spring, County Durham. Arthur ran with the Houghton and District Harriers. When war broke out Arthur and three of his five brothers joined up. His regiment was the Durham Light Infantry and he did his training at Bullswater Camp, Woking, Surrey when he was a Lance Corporal in 1914, before he proceeded to the Flanders trenches. On one of his precious leaves he married in haste, as many soldiers did who had seen the countless deaths and injuries and knew their own chances of survival were not good. On one occasion in the trenches Arthur took command of his company, being a temporary Second Lieutenant, when senior officers became casualties. He led several attacks on an enemy position and behaved with great coolness and courage until his battalion was relieved. For this conspicuous gallantry he was awarded the Military Cross, but only weeks later he was killed and never got the chance to see his daughter. His name is on the Menin Gate. His elder brother William had a son soon after Arthur’s death and named that son for Arthur.
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Gertrude Bell
Fiona Hall, Communications and Retail Manager at the Green Howards Museum submitted this story about one of the most important women of the First World War (in fact of any) era. I’m intrigued by this local hero – a complex character. There’s not enough space here to describe the many achievements of Gertrude Bell, and that’s not the point of this entry. Although I do recommend you take some time to acquaint yourself with her if you are not already familiar with this fascinating woman – archaeologist, mountaineer, one of the first women to gain a degree at Oxford (a First in History) but an anti-suffrage campaigner, the first to work for British military intelligence, colleague of TE Lawrence, and also the first to write a government white paper. She was born in 1868 into the sixth richest family in England, the granddaughter of the industrialist Sir Isaac Lowthian Bell, and lived in Redcar. When war broke out her request for a government posting to the Middle East was denied. Instead she volunteered with the Red Cross, taking charge of the missing and wounded office in Boulogne. Meanwhile her brother, Maurice, a career soldier and Boer War veteran was commanding the 4th Bn The Yorkshire Regiment on the western front. Imagine working in the environment Gertrude was working in- with the very possible chance she may have to ‘process’ information about the fate of her own brother. Maurice was in fact invalided home in 1916 and died in 1944. In…
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John Thompson
John Thompson, husband of Martha and father figure to Thomas, John and Jonah, resided in Little Crakehall, Bedale, where he worked as a blacksmith – an occupation that in December 1914, aged 44 years, led him to be specially enlisted into the Army Service Corps to serve as a farrier. Unbeknown to his family, John’s service records reveal that in January 1915, he embarked with the British Expeditionary Force to the Western Front, being transferred to Egypt in October, and later transferred to Salonica, Greece in November. On one occasion in 1915, when on active service, John was found to be ‘drunk, out of bounds and improperly dressed’, offences for which he received a fine of five shillings on January 1st 1916- not a good way to start the new year! In July 1916, John was admitted to the 2nd Western General Hospital, Manchester, where he received treatment for myalgia, influenza and rheumatism in his feet and reported suffering from a ‘troublesome cough’. Following discharge from hospital in August, John was deemed ‘no longer physically fit for war services’ and subsequently returned home to Little Crakehall that September. John soon discovered that he was not the only family member to suffer in July 1916 – aged only 20, his son, John Jr, had been killed in the Battle of the Somme. On the 10th of July 1916, John Jr, serving with the 8th Battalion Yorkshire Regiment, was ordered to attack and capture Contalmaison. Advancing from Horseshoe Trench, John came under…