Pte 23145 Ernest Poole

• Age: 30
• From: Walsall, Staffs
• Regiment: The King's (Liverpool Regiment) 17th Btn
• D.O.W Thursday 2nd May 1918
• Commemorated at: Arneke British Cem
  Panel Ref: II.B 10

Ernest Poole was born on 11th July 1888 in Walsall, the youngest son of Charles Poole and his wife Mary Jane (nee Lowther). His father was from Somerset, and his mother from Hull, Yorkshire.  They married in Bridgewater, Somerset in 1866 and had ten children, all born in Walsall, of which Ernest was the youngest:  Eliza Jane 1867, Ellen 1869, William 1870, Clara 1872 (who died at age 1), George 1875 , Alice 1877, Charles 1880, Arthur 1882, and Harry 1886.

By the time he was 21, he was working as a railway porter and the 1911 Census finds him as a boarder,  at 54 Row Heath Road, Cotteridge, King’s Norton, lodging with a fellow railway worker. Kings Norton is just south of Bourneville, a town yet to be swallowed up by the expanding urban sprawl of Birmingham. It seems that Ernest may have made the move to Ellesmere Port shortly afterwards, as there were jobs on offer in the local factories and associated industries, especially after The Wolverhampton Iron Works relocated there just before the war, with hundreds of workers from the Walsall/Wolverhampton/Bilston areas making the move, and Ernest may have had friends urging him to join them. The 1911 Census finds his parents with his brother Arthur, 28, are at 150 Queen Street.  His father is 70, and still working, his mother is 65. They have been married for 45 years.

His father passed away in 1913, so Ernest may have moved with his mother shortly afterwards. So far, the only evidence is written on his war record, where an address for his mother is given as Fleming Street, Ellesmere Port, right at the heart of the newly developing town. He is not however, recorded on the town’s war memorial, and later correspondence between the army and his mother after the war was being sent to her home at 34 Highbury Road, King’s Heath, south Birmingham.

He does describe himself as a ‘Cement Runner’ when he attested in Liverpool on 09 November 1914. Further weight to the possibility of him working in Ellesmere Port is the fact that there was a cement factory there, plus he was unlikely to have travelled from south Birmingham to attest. Although most in Ellesmere Port attested for the Cheshire’s, a sizeable number headed over to Liverpool.

On enlistment, he was posted as Private No. 23145 to the 4th City Battalion, 20th Battalion, The King’s Liverpool Regiment. formed in Liverpool from 16 October 1914, and based initially at Tournament Hall Knotty Ash.

During his training, he was promoted to lance-corporal on 19 March 1915, then corporal on 1 July 1915, but just over two months later he requested to be reinstated as a private, a rank he retained for the rest of his war service.

By the 07 November 1915, Private Poole was with the 20th Battalion when they landed in Boulogne. A significant engagement for the 20ths was in support of the ill-fated Nivelle Offensive, where Britain initiated the Battle of the Scarpe in the Arras area on 9 April. However, both the 19th and 20th Battalions were eventually withdrawn, having suffered heavy losses within about 100 yards (91m) of the wire. 

On the 8 February 1918, the 20th Battalion was disbanded in France and men posted to other Pal’s battalions. Private Poole was moved to the 17th Battalion and was swiftly involved in the Allied defence against Operation Michael during the German Spring Offensive. The 17ths were badly depleted, and it was in this action that Private Ernest Poole lost his life, aged thirty. He was wounded in action on 29th April, receiving gunshot wounds to his head, arms, hand and both legs, succumbing three days later in the casualty clearing station in the field on 02nd May 1918.

Ernest now rests at Arneke British Cemetery, Nord, France, where his mother requested ‘AT REST’ be added to his headstone.

The cemetery was begun by the 13th Casualty Clearing Station which moved to Arneke from the Proven area in October 1917. It was joined by the 10th and 44th Clearing Stations in April 1918. The cemetery was used by these hospitals until the end of May, and again from July to September 1918 by the 62nd (1/2nd London) Clearing Station. In November it was used for a short time by the 4th and 10th Stationary Hospitals. A few French soldiers were buried from clearing stations in April 1918 and French units buried in Plots IV and V at the north-west end of the cemetery, mainly in May and June 1918. Arneke British Cemetery contains 435 Commonwealth burials of the First World War and five from the Second World War. There are also 126 French and five German war graves. The cemetery was designed by Sir Herbert Baker.

His death was reported in the Walsall Observer on 11th May 1918:

“Private Ernest Poole, youngest son of the late Sergeant C. Poole, Queen Street, Pleck, died in a French hospital on May 2 from wounds in both legs and the left arm.  He enlisted in the King’s Liverpools in 1914, and took part in every engagement from the Somme to the present enemy offensive, during which he received his mortal wounds. Two brothers are serving in France, Company Sergeant Major Charles Poole, South Staffords, who has served 21 years in the Army, and Sapper Arthur Poole, Royal Engineers.”

Grateful thanks are extended to Mike Royden for his detailed biography of Ernest.