Pte 23868 William Henry Woodward

William Henry Woodward was born on 21st July 1896, the only child of William Oulton Woodward and his wife Mary (née Moss). His parents married in 1894 in St. Saviour’s Church, Everton, when his father, a butcher, was 21 and his mother 22, both living in St. Domingo Grove, Everton.

 

William was baptised in the same church on 11th October 1896, his parents’ residence given as 6 Samuel Street, and his father’s occupation as butcher.

 

Sadly, his mother died in November 1897 at the age of 25, when William was one year old.  His father remarried in 1899 to Martha Watts Hunt, born in 1878 in Liverpool.

 

A daughter Martha was born in December 1899 who died at three weeks. They had two sons who survived:  Francis Oulton in 1901 and Harold Oulton in 1908.

 

The 1901 census finds the family at 46 Pitt Street. His father is 27, a butcher/storekeeper, Martha is 22, and William is 4.

 

When William was 12 his father died, in 1909, aged 35. William stayed with his stepmother (the only mother he had ever known). 

 

In 1911 his widowed stepmother Martha is head of household at 40 Bala Street, Anfield.  She is 32, a grocer/provisioner/dealer. William  who is listed as son, is 14 years of age, and an office boy in a tobacco factory, his half brother Harold is 2.  Francis, 9, is an inmate in the Bluecoat Hospital, Wavertree.  Also in the household is his stepmother’s widowed father, Francis Hunt, 61, a general labour born in Kildare, Ireland. 

 

William enlisted in Liverpool in late 1914 when he would have been 18 years old, as Private 23868, joining the 20th Battalion of The King's Liverpool Regiment.  

 

He did not ship overseas with his battalion in November 1915 (when he would have been 19), but remained in England, reason unknown, and at some point was transferred to the 12th Bn K.L.R.  

 

He shipped overseas with the 12th Bn, in 1916 at the earliest.  

 

In 1916 they saw action at the Battle of Mount Sorrel, recapturing the heights with the Canadians. They were in action at the Somme at Delville Wood, Guillemont, Flers-Courcelette, and Le Transloy.  In 1917 they were in action during the German retreat to the Hindenburg Line, the Battles of Langemarck, the Menin Road Ridge, and Polygon Wood.

 

It is not known when William was wounded, but his name appeared in the list of K.L.R. wounded published in the Weekly Casualty List and the Liverpool Daily Post on 20th November 1917:  

Woodward 23868 A. [sic] (Anfield, Liverpool).  (No A. Woodward has been found with this regimental number.)

 

At some point, possibly after recovering from his wounds, he was posted to the 4th Bn K.L.R. The 4th Kings were part of 98th Infantry Brigade, 33rd Division and in January 1918 were in the Ypres Salient.  

 

 

It is not known when William suffered his fatal wounds, but he was transported to one of the hospitals in Wimereux, on the coast, where he succumbed to his wounds on 18th April 1918.

 

He now rests at Wimereux Cemetery where his headstone bears the epitaph:

"ONE OF THE BEST. HE DIED THAT WE MIGHT LIVE"

Wimereux was the headquarters of the Queen Mary's Army Auxilliary Corps during the First World War and in 1919 it became the General Headquarters of the British Army. From October 1914 onwards, Boulogne and Wimereux formed an important hospital centre and until June 1918, the medical units at Wimereux used the communal cemetery for burials, the south-eastern half having been set aside for Commonwealth graves, although a few burial were also made among the civilian graves. By June 1918, this half of the cemetery was filled, and subsequent burials from the hospitals at Wimereux were made in the new military cemetery at Terlincthun. During the Second World War, British Rear Headquarters moved from Boulogne to Wimereux for a few days in May 1940, prior to the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force from Dunkirk. Thereafter, Wimereux was in German hands and the German Naval Headquarters were situated on the northern side of the town. After D-Day, as Allied forces moved northwards, the town was shelled from Cap Griz-Nez, and was re-taken by the Canadian 1st Army on 22 September 1944. Wimereux Communal Cemetery contains 2,847, Commonwealth burials of the First World War, two of them unidentified. Buried among them is Lt.-Col. John McCrae, author of the poem "In Flanders Fields." There are also five French and a plot of 170 German war graves. The cemetery also contains 14 Second World War burials, six of them unidentified. The Commonwealth section was designed by Charles Holden.

 

His family placed a notice in the Liverpool Echo on 23rd April 1918:

“April 18, died of wounds received in action, in his 22nd year, Private William H. Woodward, K.L.R., the dearly loved eldest son of Mrs. M. and the late William Woodward, 40, Bala Street, Anfield. 
     We have lost, heaven has gained,

 

Soldiers’ Effects, giving his number as 20/23868, 4th Bn, shows that his Army effects and a War Gratuity of £16 went to his mother Martha Watts Woodward, 40 Bala Street, Anfield.  The pension card in the name of his mother Martha does not specify the amount awarded. 

 

Martha was still living at 40 Bala Street in 1939.  She died in 1957, aged 78.  His half brothers both married and remained in Liverpool.  In 1939 Francis is a factory night watchman; he died in 1941 at the age of 39.  Harold is a chartering clerk for a shipping agent; he died in 1980, aged 71.

 

Sadly, William has not been identified on any memorial.

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