Richards Lloyd Robert, also known as Richie, was born in 1894 in Llanellechid, Caernarvonshire. In 1901 he lived with his parents, his sister Annie, his grandmother, an uncle and two cousins at 34 Rock Terrace, Bethesda, the family home of his father. His parents married in 1892.

In 1911, age 17 years, Richard was living as a boarder on 17 Twyning Road, Birmingham, working as a bank clerk with the London City & Midlands County Bank.  In the next years he would move to the Oswestry branch. At Oswestry he boarded with Mr Hignett, coal merchant, at 4 Edward Street, Oswestry.

Richard enlisted in King’s Shropshire Light Infantry on 24 January 1916 and, after training, was posted to 6 Bn. He likely went over to France late in 1917 as a draft. Richard was taken prisoner on 22 March 1918 during the Operation Michael, Kaiser Offensive. On this day his battalion was in the front line at Happencourt in Northern France. During the afternoon they were attacked by German troops and pushed out of the front line. A great number of the company were cut off and surrounded with many taken prisoner.

Richard Lloyd Roberts died in captivity on 6 June 1918 and is buried at Hautmont Communal Cemetery – Hautmont was in German hands until November 1918, the cemetery was used for PoWs and their own dead. He died of illness, probably thypus, which was rife in PoWs camps. He is also recorded on the Bethesda War Memorial as well as on the London City & Midlands Bank War Memorial in London.

Prisoners of War – PoW were protected by the 1907 Hague Convention (superseded in 1929 Geneva Convention) governing ‘the rules of war’ including the treatment of PoWs. As nowadays, the principal organisation policing and monitoring the legislation was the International Red Cross which liaised and passed on news to the relevant organisation in the home country, in the UK this was the British Help Committee.

Richard LLoyd Roberts
Bethesda War Memorial (Catherine Yeardley)

Acknowledgements: Photos by Catherine Yeardley

References and Sources

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