Believed to be John Edward Roberts – known as ’Jack’ as familial name.

Jack Roberts was born in 1894 in Oswestry. His parents were William and Elizabeth Ann (nee Lloyd) Roberts. Jack was their first child; he had 2 siblings, William and Susan. In 1901 Jack was living with his paternal grandparents at Gronwen, Morda near Oswestry, his parents and siblings were living a few houses away. His father worked as a farm wagoner, his 2 sons would follow him as agricultural labourers and in 1911 William was a cowman, and Jack was a wagoner at Tan y Mynydd Farm, Bronygarth. Their mother died in 1904 and some time afterwards their father moved into Oswestry and was living at 8 Duke Street and later at 32 Gate Street.

Jack joined the army regulars, probably in 1912 when he turned 18, serving with 1 Bn Royal Welsh Fusiliers and went over to France with the battalion on 6 October 1914. He was wounded in November. In a letter to his brother, published in the Liverpool Daily Post, he describes what happened – ‘I was wounded through my left shoulder bone 5 weeks ago at Ypres in a bayonet charge. I was lucky not to be taken prisoner as well for I fell right in amongst the Germans. When we started the charge there were only 36 men all told including NCOs and men. We have no officers left. We were at Antwerp with the Belgian Army, the French Royal Marines, and the Royal Naval Reserve. The Germans were too strong for us there so we had to retire down to just the other side of the city of Ghent. There we remained for 4 days. When the Germans came down we were between 2 German armies. General Capper (C/O 7 Division) retired us on the double along the road for 7 miles to Ghent, with fixed bayonets, one file each side of the road. This was on Sunday night. Then we had a forced march to Ostend. After that we trained down to Ypres where we started the great battle. That was hot work and we had to stick in the trenches for 13 days before we could get anyone else to reinforce or support us. I and a few more men got surrounded but we managed to get away in the darkness on account of the German sentry falling asleep. I never had the wind up so much in all my life. After that I took part in several bayonet charges…hot ones too. The remnant of  the  RWF were attached to the Queen’s Royal West Surrey Regiment on account of having hardly any men. My young master* is a prisoner of war in Crefeld, (now Krefeld) Germany. (*likely Jack was an officer’s servant or batman and his ‘officer’ was captured)

Jack recovered from his wound and returned to duty. At this time it is possible he was posted to 19 Bn RWF rather than his old battalion. He was KIA 15 February 1917, most probably due to shell fire, at Rancourt on the Somme. On this day, at 3.50pm and for the next half hour, an artillery and machine gun barrage was laid down on the enemy lines. The enemy retaliated shelling the trenches on the right of the battalion’s front: casualties were 1 NCO (Jack) killed and 5 ORs wounded. His body was lost and he is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial. Jack is also commemorated at Holy Trinity Church, Oswestry.

BROTHER TO Private 10037 William Roberts, 1 / 4 Bn or 1 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. DoW 30 October 1917, Dozinghem Military Cemetery 

Acknowledgements.

References and Sources

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