East Peckham St. Michaels

Transcription

1 East Peckham St. Michaels The village of East Peckham which is situated on the River Medway approximately five miles to the east of Tonbridge is comprised of nine hamlets and is spread out over quite a large geographical area. Although common for towns, but something of an anomaly for a village, is the fact that East Peckham has more than one parish church and even more unusual for a village is that it has more than one external war memorial. The original East Peckham Church was St. Michaels up at Roydon, high on a hilltop overlooking several of the surrounding villages. The church became impractical for the worship of the growing population, as it was a long walk from the new village centre where the majority of the population of 3000 had settled. St. Michaels is now redundant in that regular worship does not take place there, and it is under the care of the Church Conservation Trust. The two memorial plaques which are shown above are located in the Lych Gate of St. Michaels church. Normally we set out the transcriptions of the researched and transcribed war memorials in alphabetical order for ease of access, but due to the thankfully small number of commemorations below, the St. Michaels, East Peckham casualties are as set out below as on the relevant memorial plaque. Oddly a casualty of the Great War who is at rest in St. Michael s churchyard is not commemorated on the memorial plaque. The following photographs and transcriptions are by Patrick D. Scullion. 1

2 The Great War COOK, EDWIN BERKELEY. M.V.O. Lieutenant-Colonel. 1st Life Guards. Died Wednesday 4 November Aged 45. Born London 4 May Eldest son of the late Major Edwin Adolphus Cook D.L., J.P. (11th Hussars), of Roydon Hall, Tonbridge, Kent, and of the late Lady Augusta Mehitabel (Minnie) Gordon-Lennox (formerly Cook), (née Palmer). Buried East Peckham (St. Michael) Churchyard, Tonbridge, Kent. Grave Ref: The Cook family plot. Eton educated, Edwin was gazetted as a Second Lieutenant in the 1st Life Guards from the Militia, on 9 July On 4 July 1891 he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant, and to a Captain on 5 May 1894, and was A.D.C. and Acting Military Secretary to Lieutenant-General Sir George Luck K.C.B. from 1898 to 1903, and promoted to Major on 29 November On 16 January 1909, Edwin was made a Brevet Lieutenant-Colonel, and to a Lieutenant-Colonel on 11 November The Household Cavalry Composite Regiment was initially commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel, Edwin Berkley Cook, M.V.O. At the commencement of the Great War, the sixteen British army regular cavalry regiments were earmarked for overseas service, whilst a seventeenth regiment was to be provided by a composite regiment formed with a troop from each of the three Household Cavalry regiments, which were the 1st Life Guards, 2nd Life Guards, and the Royal Horse Guards, and were assigned a mobilisation role in the 4th Cavalry Brigade. The entry in Edwin s private diary for 22 October 1914 reads: - Dug ourselves in all morning. Astor and I were hit by shell at 2. Got moved at 7. Motor Ambulance to Bailleul. Stayed in Bailleul hospital. F. Guest, B. Lambton, and Sir John French came in afternoon. F.G. motored me to Boulogne. Arrived on board hospital ship Carisbrooke Castle 8 P.M. Boat left at 10 P.M. Edwin died at Sussex House, Regents Park, London N.W. on Wednesday 4 November 1914, of the wounds he had received near Messines. Although this 2

3 brief tribute is in rememberance of his eldest son, it would be somewhat remiss to not make mention of the fact that the then Captain Edwin Adolphus Cook ( ) of the 11th Hussars, was one of only four officers who tried to form up behind the Russian guns after taking part in The Charge of the Light Brigade during the battle of Balaclava on 25 October 1854, and that he was subsequently awarded the Légion d'honneur by France. DYKE, FRANCIS HART. Second Lieutenant. Queen's Own (Royal West Kent Regiment), attached to the 7th (Service) Battalion, The Loyal North Lancashire Regiment. Died Thursday 27 September Aged 19. Born East Malling, Kent 25 January Eldest son of Colonel Edward Hart Dyke (late Royal Artillery), and Grace Elizabeth Dyke (née MacAdam), of Leavers, Hadlow, Tonbridge, Kent. Buried Fusilier Wood Cemetery, Hollebeke, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium. Commemorated at Duhallow Advanced Dressing Station Cemetery, Ieper, West- Vlaanderen, Belgium, on the Fusilier Wood Memorial. Francis was educated at Wellington College, and passed into the Sandhurst Military Academy in September 1915, gaining one of the Cadet Scholarships. In July 1916, Francis was gazetted as a Second Lieutenant in the Queen's Own (Royal West Kent Regiment). At the time of his death near Ypres, Francis was serving as an attached junior officer with the 7th (Service) Battalion, The Loyal North Lancashire Regiment, whose Adjutant wrote the following to Colonel and Mrs. Edward Hart Dyke; From the time he joined us, though he was the youngest officer in the regiment, his bright nature and charming manners were an example to us all. He was one of the best officers in the regiment, and very popular with the men, and what is more, they trusted him absolutely and had the greatest confidence in him. After the Armistice, the cemetery where Francis is commemorated was enlarged when graves were brought into the cemetery from isolated sites and a number of small cemeteries on the battlefields around Ypres. Special memorials commemorate a number of casualties known to have been buried in two of these cemeteries, Malakoff Farm Cemetery, Brielen, and Fusilier Wood Cemetery, Hollebeke, whose graves were destroyed by shellfire, unfortunately that of Francis was amongst the latter. PAYNE, EDWARD. Serjeant, G/196. 6th (Service) Battalion, Queen's Own (Royal West Kent Regiment). Died Saturday 7 October Aged 26. Born Carshalton, Surrey. Enlisted Tonbridge, Kent. Son of Alfred Edward and Elizabeth Mary Payne, of Headley Court Garden Cottage, Epsom, Surrey. Buried Heilly Station Cemetery, Mericourt-l'Abbe, Somme, France. Grave Ref: III. D. 61. At the time of the 1901 census, the Payne family resided at Betchworth, Surrey. Edward was posted to France on Tuesday 1 June

4 MOON, JACK FREDERICK. M.M. Gunner, th Siege Battery, Royal Garrison Artillery. Died Saturday 21 September Aged 22. Born Royal Tunbridge Wells, Kent. Enlisted Maidstone, Kent. Resided Nettlestead, Maidstone, Kent. Son of Thomas and Alice Moon of Goudhurst, Kent. Husband of Gladys R. Moon of 32, Northcote Road, Portswood, Southampton. Buried Mont Huon Military Cemetery, Le Treport, Seine-Maritime, France. Grave Ref: VII. G. 10B. BECKETT, R. Private, /1st Huntingdon Cyclist Battalion. Died Thursday 6 June Aged 20. Foster son of Mrs. Constant of Hadlow of Tonbridge, Kent. Buried East Peckham (St. Michaels) Churchyard. Grave Ref: South-West corner of new ground. 1/1st Huntingdon Cyclist Battalion remained in England for the duration of the Great War, and at the time of Private Beckett s death it was at Whitby, Yorkshire. 4

5 The Great War Lost Man HAMMOND, JOHN. Private, nd Agricultural Company, Labour Corps. Died Saturday 16 November Aged 36. Born East Peckham, Tonbridge, Kent. Son of William Hammond and the late Elizabeth Hammond of Paddlesworth, Snodland, West Malling, Kent. Buried East Peckham (St. Michaels) Churchyard. Grave Ref: West boundary of new ground. At the time of the 1901 census, the Hammond family resided at Tutsham, West Farleigh, Maidstone, Kent. Head of the house was 44 year old East Peckham, Tonbridge, Kent native William Hammond, who was a widower and employed as a Farm Labourer. The unfortunate oversight of John having been omitted from the St. Michaels, East Peckham Great War memorial plaque, is compounded by 5

6 the fact that he is not commemorated at Snodland, or at West Farleigh, and as such it would seem very likely that he has no form of civic rememberance in Kent or elsewhere. St. Michaels, East Peckham Great War Commemorations Panel St. Michaels, East Peckham Second World War Commemorations Panel 6