Pte 15500 Hugh Woodney

• Age: 21
• From: Liverpool
• Regiment: The King's (Liverpool Regiment) 17th Btn
• K.I.A Wednesday 12th July 1916
• Commemorated at: Bernafay Wood Brit Cem
  Panel Ref: H.53

Hugh was born 01st February 1895 at Great Nelson Street, Liverpool. He was the son of Christopher Woodney and his Monaghan, Eire born wife Mary Ann (nee Harcourt)  who were married on 29th July 1883 at St Peter’s Church, Liverpool. They had two daughters, Elizabeth, born in the September quarter of 1884 and Clara, born 24th October 1890.

1911 Census - 18 Dacre Street, Smithdown Road, - Father (Married) with Clara and Hugh now age 16 and working as a Clerk with a clothing manufacturer. 

Hugh enlisted at St George's Hall, Liverpool joining the 17th Battalon (Pals) Battalion of The King's Liverpool Regiment as Private 15500. 

He was billeted at Prescot Watch Factory from 14^th September 1914, he trained there and also at Knowsley Hall. On 30th April 1915 the 17th Battalion alongside the other three Pals battalions left Liverpool via Prescot Station for further training at Belton Park, Grantham. They remained here until September 1915 when they reached Larkhill Camp on Salisbury Plain. He arrived in France on 7^th November 1915.

Hugh as part of the 17th Battalion was involved in the succesful capture of Montauban on 01st July 1916. The next objective for the Liverpool Pals was to assist with the clearing of the Germans from Trones Wood.

The murderous fighting that went on inside Trones Wood rendered it impossible to put specific dates on some of the casualties which is why many of the 17^th Battalion losses have been bracketed as killed in action between 10^th – 12th July 1916. The conditions are best described in the following passage from Everard Wyrall’s book The History of The King’s Regiment (Liverpool) Volume II. 

The remembrance of Trones Wood in July 1916 to those who passed through it is of a noisome, horrible place, of a tangled mass of trees and undergrowth which had been tossed and flung about in frightful confusion by the shells of both sides. Of the ghastly dead which lay about in all directions, and of DEATH, lurking in every hole and corner with greedy hands ready to snatch the lives of the unwary. The place was a Death trap, and although the attacks were made with great determination,   the presence of snipers who could not be detected and often fired into the backs of our men made the clearing of the wood impossible.

Hugh now rests at Bernafay Wood British Cemetery. 

The cemetery was begun by a dressing station in August 1916 and used as a front-line cemetery until the following April. It contained at the Armistice 284 burials but was then increased when graves were brought in from Bernafay Wood North Cemetery and from the battlefields immediately east of the wood.  Bernafay Wood British Cemetery now contains 945 burials and commemorations of the First World War, 417 of which are unidentified.