Richard Henry Cooper was born in Shrewsbury in 1885, the middle of five children and only son of Samuel, a railway brakeman, and Esther, his mother, living at 12 Water Street, Shrewsbury. In 1901 he joined the army. No details can be found of his army service but by 1911 he had returned to Civvy Street and was working as a general labourer in a brickworks in Ellesmere (possibly at Elson on Duddleston Rd) and boarding at 66 Scotland Street, Ellesmere. In 1911 he married Kathleen Crowther and they moved to live at 13 Oswald Place, Oswestry, where he started work for Oswestry Corporation as a labourer.

He would have been on the army reserve list and at the outbreak of war, after mobilisation, reported to 3 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry (Reserve Battalion) at Shrewsbury in August 1914. He went over to France on the 10 February 1915 and was posted to 2 Bn KSLI in a draft of reinforcements joining the battalion on 13 February 1915 at Dickesbusch – this was the same draft as Second Lieutenant Gilbert R Venables and Private 7035 Thomas W Trow . Richard was KIA on 12 April 1915 at Polygon Wood, Ypres when the battalion was alternating 48 hour duties in the trenches and billets at Ypres. KIA at the same time was Private 6958 Oswald Peters, 2 Bn KSLI. Richard has no known grave and is commemorated on the Menin Gate, Ypres. He is also on the war memorial at Holy Trinity Church, Oswestry.

Acknowledgements.

References and Sources

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