Pte 235307 Ernest Jinman

• Age: 33
• From: Eastbourne, Sussex
• Regiment: The King's (Liverpool Regiment) 19th Btn
• K.I.A Friday 22nd March 1918
• Commemorated at: Savy Brit Cem
  Panel Ref: Roupy Rd. Mem. 62

Ernest Jinman was born in June 1884 at Eastbourne and was the son of George Jinman and his wife Martha Ann (nee Homer). His parents married 1866 in Westhampnett, Sussex.

22^nd  GERMAINE – HAM- MOYENCOURT

The battalion moved up accordingly being in position at 6:30 a.m. About 3pm the enemy attacked the left of our position and advanced on our left flank towards FLUQUIERES. At 4:30 pm an attack was launched on our front and the enemy forced his way through on our right. The remainder of the Battalion was forced to retire to south of FLUQUIERES. During this engagement the Battalion lost 11 Officers and About 21 O.R. The order was given to retire to the defences at HAM. The Battalion by this time was very weak, and passing through the 20^th Division took up positions in HAM, as ordered, getting into position at 2am.

Ernest was originally declared Wounded and Missing and there is a record of an enquiry made in August 1918 to the British Red Cross & Order of St John. There is no record of a response.   

The CWGC Graves Registration form shows that Ernest, along with a number of others from the 19th Bn, was buried by the Germans, but after the war a Special Memorial was erected in Savy British Cemetery :  

“To the memory of these 68 British Soldiers, Killed in Action in March 1918, and buried at the time in the German Cemetery on the St. Quentin-Roupy Road, whose graves are now lost."

The inscription on Ernest's headstone reads:

“PEACE PERFECT PEACE”

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 On the 21st March 1918 Savy and Roupy were successfully defended by the 30th Division, but the line was withdrawn after nightfall.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.

Soldiers Effects and Pension to widow Emily E., and child Leonard Cuthbert Jinman.

His father died in the December quarter of 1921, aged 82.

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