HOMEFRONT – Place / Occupation / St Oswald’s Church
JOB – Apprentice (In Shoe Shop)
UNIT – 1/5 Bn Gloucestershire Regiment.
RANK – Private 203645
THEATRE – Ypres / Third Ypres / Battle of Langemark, St Julien 1/5 Bn Gloucestershire Regiment, 15-18 Aug 1917 .
DIED – DoW 17 August 1917. Aged 21
BURIED – New Irish Farm Cemetery. (CWGC)
Private 203645 Frederick C Plimmer was born in 1896, the third child of William and Elizabeth Plimmer; his siblings were Percy and Lilian – another brother, Ernest, was born in 1912 (see below). His father had a boot and shoe shop at 18 Church Street, Oswestry where they lived over the shop. By 1911 he and his family had moved to ‘Highfield’ on Oakhurst Road. He was working as an apprentice in his father’s shoe shop – and where he would later live. Frederick enlisted at Shrewsbury joining the 1/5 Bn Gloucestershire Regiment – a territorial battalion. On enlistment he was given the number 8389, changed later to 203645. No information is available as to when he first went to France.
Frederick died of wounds on 17 August 1917 and is buried at New Irish Farm Cemetery north of Ypres. His body was reinterred from one of the many battlefield cemeteries. He was wounded during the Battle of Langemark. His battalion was heavily engaged near to St Julien, over the 16-17 August they suffered 1 officer killed and 1 wounded and 209 other ranks killed, wounded or missing. Frederick is also commemorated at St Oswald’s Church Oswestry.
His brother Ernest, b 1912, was a casualty of WW2 and is named on the WW2 plaques on Oswestry Memorial Gates. He was KIA 27 August 1944 and is buried at St Desir War Cemetery, Calvados, France. (CWGC)
Acknowledgements.
END