Pte 86974 Ernest Alexander Robson

 

Sadly, his mother died when Ernest was not yet two years old, in April 1898, at the age of 24.  

 

In 1901 his widowed father is still at 287 Scotland Road.  Albert, 32, is a cotton (?) manager, Irene is 5, and Ernest 4.  Also in the household is his widowed paternal grandmother, Ann Robson, 66, and aunt Mary Robson, 35, domestic housekeeper. 

 

His father remarried the next year, to Elizabeth Ferguson.  They had children Albert, Lilian, and William.

 

In 1911 the family is living at 20 Walter Street (on the corner of the Dock Road near Stanley Dock).  His father, 42, is a dining room proprietor, working at home. They have two servants assisting in the business.  His sister Irene, 15,  is living with an aunt and uncle.  His stepmother Elizabeth is 32, Ernest is 14, a telegraph messenger with the Bootle Post Office.  Albert is 7, Lilian, 4 and William 2.  Not long after the census, William died, in July 1911, aged 2.

 

Albert and Elizabeth had two more daughters, Minnie in 1912, and Elsie in 1918.  Minnie died at age 5, and was buried in December 1918, just one month before Ernest died.

 

Ernest crossed the River Mersey and enlisted in Wallasey, Cheshire (perhaps because he was under age and did not have his parents’ permission).   Based on the amount of the War Gratuity, Ernest enlisted in about December 1914, when he would have been 18 years old.  He served in the Royal Army Medical Corps as Private 52826. His service record has not survived, so the details are not known.   His medal card shows that after training Ernest shipped to the Balkan front and arrived in Salonika on 4th August 1915.  It is not known when or why he was transferred to the 18th Battalion of The King’s Liverpool Regiment. He may have been invalided home with malaria (which caused more casualties than enemy action in the Balkan theatre).  He served in the 18th Battalion as Private 86974.

The battalion War Diary records:

 

 

“25th December, Christmas Day.  The day, after church parades, was observed as a general holiday. At 1300 hours the men sat down to their Christmas dinner, the Sergeants acting as waiters.  A good dinner had been obtained, consisting of roast pork, potatoes, cabbage and carrots, there being a liberal helping for each man. There was also a free issue of beer and the usual Christmas pudding. At night the Officers had their dinner, as did the Sergeants, and a very enjoyable day, free from the discomforts of the three former Christmas Days abroad by the battalion, was spent by all ranks.”  The following entries show parades, education, training, and route marches, until the end of January. 

There is no mention of accidents or casualties in the Battalion War Diary.

 

Sadly, after surviving war and disease in the Balkans, and the fighting on the Western Front, 22-year old Ernest died on the 07th January 1919 of accidental injuries (Soldiers’ Effects states fractured skull).  

 

Ernest now rests at Huy (La Sarte) Communal Cemetery in Belgium where his headstone bears the epitaph:

"HIS DUTY NOBLY DONE".

 

The 50th (Northumbrian) Casualty Clearing Station was posted to Huy from January to May 1919. The Communal Cemetery contains a plot of 109 Commonwealth burials of the First World War and seven war graves of other nationalities.

Ernest earned his three medals. 

 

Elizabeth (listed as widow in one record and as mother in the other) received Ernest’s Army effects of £23-8s-11d and a War Gratuity of £23.  His father, living at 16 Mitylene Street, Liverpool, received a pension of 5/- a week (showing rank as Private).  CWGC Graves Registration form and two of three pension cards show Lance Corporal.  

 

Ernest’s death appeared in the Weekly Casualty List of 18th February 1919:  Robson 86974 L-Cpl E.A. (Liverpool).

 

His father died in 1927, aged 59, and his (step)mother Elizabeth died in 1947 aged 69.