Pte 303044 Sydney Walter Smith

The 1901 Census shows the family are living at 6 Mill Lane, Liscard, with six children and a boarder.  His father, 56, and Cecil, 23, are draper’s assistants, his mother is 46, Amy, 27, and Mabel, 15, are school teachers, Blanche is 20, Winifred 18, is a dressmaker, and Walter is 8.

 

His brother Cecil died in 1910, at the age of 33. 

 

The 1911 Census finds the family at 33 Parkfield Drive, Liscard. His father is 66, a draper’s buyer, his mother is 56. Six of their eight children are still living, and four are at home; Blanche is 30, helping at home, Winifred is 28, working on her own account from home, Mabel is 25, a school teacher for the council.  Walter is 18, working as an apprentice cotton broker.  

He enlisted at St George's Hall in Liverpool joining the 18th Battalion of The King's Liverpool Regiment as Private 16943.

From the 23^rd September 1914 he was billeted at Hooton Park Race Course and remained there until 03^rd December 1914 when they moved into the hutted accommodation at Lord Derby’s estate at Knowsley Hall. On 30th April 1915 the 18th Battalion alongside the other three Pals battalions left Liverpool via Prescot Station for further training at Belton Park, Grantham. They remained here until September 1915 when they reached Larkhill Camp on Salisbury Plain. 

At some point Sydney Walter transferred to the 2nd Battalion of the Lancashire Fusiliers. He was serving with them when he was killed in action on 03rd May 1917.

His body was not recovered from the battlefield or was subsequently lost as his name is commemorated at Bay 5 on the Arras Memorial in France.

 

The ARRAS MEMORIAL commemorates almost 35,000 servicemen from the United Kingdom, South Africa and New Zealand who died in the Arras sector between the spring of 1916 and 7 August 1918, the eve of the Advance to Victory, and have no known grave. The most conspicuous events of this period were the Arras offensive of April-May 1917, and the German attack in the spring of 1918. Canadian and Australian servicemen killed in these operations are commemorated by memorials at Vimy and Villers-Bretonneux. A separate memorial remembers those killed in the Battle of Cambrai in 1917. Both cemetery and memorial were designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, with sculpture by Sir William Reid Dick. The memorial was unveiled by Lord Trenchard, Marshal of the Royal Air Force on the 31 July 1932 (originally it had been scheduled for 15 May, but due to the sudden death of French President Doumer, as a mark of respect, the ceremony was postponed until July).

 

His parents placed a notice in the Liverpool Echo on 30th May 1917:  

 

Walter earned his three medals, but sadly his Victory Medal and British War Medal were returned, reason unknown.

 

His Army effects, including a War Gratuity of £12 went to his father John.