BORN – Llansilin
HOMEFRONT – Place / Occupation / St Oswald’s / Llansilin War Memorial
JOB – Bricklayer
UNIT – 5 Bn King’s Shropshire light Infantry
RANK – Private 18247
THEATRE – Ypres / Elveringhe. 5 Bn King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. 2 February 1916.
DIED – KIA 2 February 1916. Aged 25.
BURIED – Menin Gate, Ypres (grave unknown). (CWGC)
David Williams was born in 1891 in Llansilin, a village about 6 miles west of Oswestry. He was the eldest child of eight siblings and also had an elder step brother from his mother’s first marriage. His parents were Thomas and Sarah Williams, his father was a shepherd and farm worker. The family lived at Pentregwyn, Llansilin. In 1911 David was still living at the family home and working as a bricklayer. David married Emily Robinson in 1912 – the marriage was registered in Oswestry. It is possible that he had up to three children, William, Jack and Thomas – there are births for surnames Williams and Robinson that are registered in Oswestry between 1912 and 1914. In 1919 Emily remarried Robert Lake.
David was KIA on 2 February 1916 at Elverdinghe in the Ypres Salient. The battalion War Diary records – ‘On the 2 February A & B coys were in Trenches while C & D were in Farm. There was heavy bombardment by the Germans and 7 men were killed and 13 wounded’. David’s body was lost and he is commemorated on the Menin Gate at Ypres. He is also on war memorials at Llansilin and St Oswald’s Church, Oswestry.
Also killed on the same day and ‘Men on the Gates’ are – Private 6953 Percy Phillips and Private 10763, Bertie Annum
Acknowledgements.
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