Pte 32346 John William Warren

John William Warren was born in Highgate, London on 24th December 1896, the son of Uriah John Warren and his wife Elizabeth (née Bamford). Uriah, a widower from Manchester, and Elizabeth, from Liverpool, married in St. Mary’s, Bootle, in 1891.  They had seven children; tragically the first four died in infancy.  Louisa, born in 1892, Uriah 1893, and Elizabeth 1894, all born and died in Bootle, where the family lived at 8 Irlam Road. By 1895 they had moved to Brighton, Sussex, where Herbert was born, who also died young.

 

By 1896 they were in Highgate, London where John was born, the first of their children to survive.  They then moved to Brixton, where Alice was born in 1898.

In 1901 they are living in Robert Street, Holborn, where his father is employed as a (sp?) grocer, John is 4, and Alice is 9 months old.  Son Alfred was born shortly after the census.

 

By 1904 they had returned to the Liverpool area, where his father’s business appears in the 1904-5 trade directory, at 114 Boundary Lane, as a dyer and laundry.

 

John wasn’t baptised until age 7, on 31st July 1904, when he and his two surviving siblings, Alice 5, and Alfred, 3, were baptised together in St. Polycarp, Everton, their parents living at 114 Boundary Lane, their father’s occupation laundryman. 

 

They are still at 114-116 Boundary Lane, West Derby Road in 1911.  His father, 52, is a self-employed laundryman, working on the premises, his mother, 40, is a laundress in the business, John, 14, Alice, 11, and Alfred, 9, are at school.  Also listed on the census and subsequently crossed off, are the four children who have died. 

He enlisted in Liverpool and was serving in the 20th Battalion, The King’s Liverpool Regiment as Private No 32346 when he was killed in action on the 12th October 1916 during the Battle of the Transloy Ridges which was part of the ongoing Somme Offensive. He was 19 years of age.

According to the 20^th Bn War Diary, on 10th October 1916 the battalion marched from Dernancourt via Mametz to Bazentin Le Grand where it bivouacked for the night. The next day the battalion moved up to site for assembly trenches, arriving about 11 p.m., where it dug in two good trenches, Nos.1 and 2 Coys front and Nos.3 and 4 Coys in rear.

From the War Diary:

Near Eaucourt L’Abbaye.  12/10/1916. The 4^th British and 6^th French armies continued the attack. Zero 2.5 p.m.  The whole XVth Corps attacked […]  The attack of 89^th Inf Bde was carried out with 2^nd Bn Bedf Regt on right, 17^th Bn KLR on left, 20^th Bn KLR in support, 19^th Bn KLR in reserve.  Battalions attacked in four waves. On the departure of the attacking battalions Nos. 1 and 2 companies advanced, each in two waves, to garrison the front line trench vacated by 2^nd Bn Bedf Regt on right and 17^th KLR on left. On Nos 1 and 2 Coys vacating front assembly trench, it was occupied by two platoons of Nos. 3 and 4 Coys respectively, from rear assembly trench. As the assaulting waves left their trenches they were met by intense machine gun fire, especially on our left. The enemy also opened heavy barrages on our front support and assembly trenches. […] Capt. H. Beckett, commanding No.1 company, reached the front line with few casualties, but Lieut R.D. Paterson leading No.2 company was killed. His company also had few casualties. The assaulting battalions were held up by very heavy machine gun fire, and made little progress.  […] At 4.20 p.m. two platoons, No.4 Coy, under Cpl Brighouse, were sent up to reinforce the left, and No.3 Coy under Cpl Sutton followed at 4.45 p.m.  Battalion HQ moved up to front line at 4.55 and remaining two platoons of No.4 Coy moved up to join Cpl Brighouse. 

Casualties during action: 

Officers – Killed Lieut. R.D. Paterson, 2^nd Lieut G.L. Grennan, Wounded – 2^nd Lieuts A.E. Griffin, L.E. Mclean Hayes, C. Buttemer, Wounded Cpl g. Brighouse.

Other Ranks killed – 20. 

It had rained incessantly at the beginning of October 1916 and the ground was full of mud. In his book ‘The Liverpool Pals’ Graham Maddocks describes the day Herbert was killed.

It was obvious that the Germans knew an attack was coming and from which direction it would be mounted. On the evening of the 11th the 20th Battalion moved up the line and dug two deep assembly trenches behind the 17th Battalion’s position for the attack the next day. The 19th Battalion also moved into its reserve positions known as Flers Trench. Although the rain has stopped, the ground was like a morass, with all the natural vegetation destroyed, it was difficult to tell exactly where the objectives lay. On the afternoon of the 12th at exactly 2.05pm, the attack began along the whole Corps line, covered by the local batteries of the Royal Field Artillery which still had line of sight. As the whistles blew, the 17th Battalion left its trenches to move forwards, at the same time No.1 and 2 Companies of the 20th Battalion moved forward and occupied the trenches vacated by the 17th. As they too went over the top, No.3 and 4 Companies took their place and waited in their turn to follow. No.2 and 3 Companies of the 19th Battalion moved up to occupy the assembly trenches dug the previous night by the 20th.

As soon as the attacking waves left their trenches the enemy artillery began to register on them and at the same time the defending infantry commenced a murderous rain of fire. Those German regiments were trained and experienced soldiers, well dug in on high ground, and for the most part, looking out on uncut wire. As such it was virtually impossible for them to miss the City Battalion men struggling to advance in the mud towards them.

Brigadier-General F.C.Stanley wrote that the Battalions were also suffering casualties due to the short shooting of the British heavy artillery fire. “I know from practical experience that they were our own guns which were shooting, and which were causing us quite a considerable number of casualties. The fault lay at that time from the fact that the heavy gunners would not send their FOO’s (Forward Observation Officers) far enough forward, but were content to observe us from right back”

Some ground was gained that day, about 150 yards, the 20th Battalion were not relieved until 24 hours later causing the men to endure another day and night in the front line trench.

He now rests at Warlencourt British Cemetery, France.

Warlencourt Cemetery is entirely a concentration cemetery, begun late in 1919 when graves were brought in from small cemeteries and the battlefields of Warlencourt and Le Sars.  The Graves Registration form shows graves from “Le Sars 6/1, 6/2, Hexham Road, Seven Elms”.

Graves were brought in from the original cemeteries at Hexham Road (Le Sars), and Seven Elms (Flers), as well as over 3,000 British graves due to the fighting which took place around the Butte de Warlencourt from the autumn of 1916 to the spring of 1917, and again in the German advance and retreat of 1918.   The cemetery now contains 3,505 Commonwealth burials and commemorations of the First World War, 1,823 of which are unidentified.

His father Uriah received John’s effects, including a War Gratuity of £3.  His mother, living at 116 Boundary Lane, and later at 86 Holt Road, Liverpool, received a pension of 5/- a week. 

 

His father died in 1929 aged 70.  In 1939 his mother Elizabeth is living with daughter Alice, a laundry maid, in Mill Road, Liverpool. Living in the same street is son Alfred and his family. His mother lived through World War Two and died in 1945, aged 75.  His parents, having suffered the deaths of five of their seven children, are buried in the same grave in the non-conformist section of Anfield Cemetery.

 

John is commemorated on Liverpool’s Hall of Remembrance, Panel 32 Left.

 

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