Pte 58671 Percy Jackson

• Age: 25
• From: Ellesmere Port
• Regiment: The King's (Liverpool Regiment) 19th Btn
• K.I.A Saturday 30th March 1918
• Commemorated at: Savy Brit Cem
  Panel Ref: Roupy Rd. Mem. 51

Percy was born on 07th August 1892 in Ellesmere Port the son of Thomas Jackson and his wife Elizabeth (nee Lewis). He was baptised on 11th September 1892. His parents married on 09th January 1882 at St Silas' Church, Toxteth. Thomas 23, a police constable, Elleston Road, Crewe, Elizabeth 22, 31 Voelas Street.

On the 1891 Census is their first child Ada, aged 8 born in Newhall, Cheshire, and Gertrude aged 3.

The 1901 Census finds the family living at 22 New Ferry Road, Lower Bebington. Percy is 8 years of age. His father is a Police Sergeant born in Lymm, Cheshire in 1859, whilst his mother was born in Lymm in 1860. Percy has a younger brother Albert E. b.1898 in Hazel Grove, Cheshire. 

By 1911 the family have moved to 22 Albion Road, Rusholme, Manchester. Both parents are present and his father is now shown as a Police pensioner.  They have been married for 29 years and have had seven children, three of whom have died. Percy is 18 and a clerk. He has two siblings in the household; his elder sister Gertrude b. 1888 at Preston Brook, Cheshire and Albert Edward who is now 13.  

His Father died on 18th December 1914

Percy enlisted in Manchester and served  in ‘B’ Company, 7th Platoon. of the 19^th Battalion, of The King’s Liverpool Regiment as Private No 58671.

As Graham Maddocks points out in his book The Liverpool Pals, the CWGC records 38 men of the 19^th Bn of The King’s Liverpool Regiment as killed in action on 30^th March 1918 when as the Battalion diary below, shown in bold type, records that the men were actually out of the line and safely on the way to St Valery- sur- Somme.

The composite battalion moved off from ROUVREL at 8.30 am at 50 yards interval between companies, arriving at SALEUX at 3.20 pm where they entrained, detraining at ST. VALERY-SUR-SOMME the same night. The night was spent at ST. VALERY-SUR-SOMME.

Apart from those whose bodies were not found and are commemorated on the Pozieres Memorial all but two have burial sites at Savy British Cemetery, which itself is within a couple of miles of Roupy and contains most of the identified men killed on 22^nd March 1918. Therefore, it would appear that the date of death for these men shown as 30^th March 1918 is purely an arbitrary one and that they were in fact killed on 22^nd March.

An impassioned notice was placed in the local press requesting information about Percy:  

JACKSON - The widowed mother, sisters, and brother, also Gertie, would be thankful if any returned British prisoner could give any news of my son, Private Percy Jackson, No. 58671, B Company, No. 9 Platoon, 19th Battalion, the King's Liverpool Regiment (Pals), St Quentin, or near missing since March 21-22 to the 30th, 1918. Kindly write to No. 22 Albion Road, Fallowfield, Manchester.

“GOD KNOWETH BEST”

Savy was taken by the 32nd Division on the 1st April 1917, after hard fighting, and Savy Wood on the 2nd. On the 21st March 1918 Savy and Roupy were successfully defended by the 30th Division, but the line was withdrawn after nightfall. The village and the wood were retaken on the 17th September 1918 by the 34th French Division, fighting on the right of the British IX Corps.

Savy British Cemetery was made in 1919, and the graves from the battlefields and from the following small cemeteries in the neighbourhood were concentrated into it.

There are now over 850, 1914-18 war casualties commemorated in this site. Of these, more than half are unidentified. Memorials are erected in the cemetery to 68 soldiers (chiefly of the 19th King's Liverpools and the 17th Manchesters), buried by the Germans in their cemetery on the St. Quentin-Roupy road, whose graves were destroyed by shell fire.

The Cemetery covers an area of 2,555 square metres and is enclosed by a low rubble wall.

CWGC records show his mother was living at 2 Dove Bank, Moor End, Mellor, Derbyshire. His mother received his Soldier's effects.

We currently have no further information on Percy Jackson. If you have or know someone who may be able to add to the history of this soldier, please contact us.