Pte 202830 James Conway (McCabe)

An online family tree gives his birthdate as 2nd December 1893, but this cannot be verified.

 

From his Soldiers’ Effects register, we know that Patrick had brothers Leo, Michael, Thomas, and George, and sisters Mary Jane, and Esther (Essie). 

 

In 1901 the family is living at 5 Denmark Place, Dublin. His father is 47, a labourer, and his mother is 40. Michael is 13, Mary Jane 11, Patrick 8 and Esther 6. (If the birthdate 02/12/1893 is correct, he would have been 7 years old.)

 

Patrick has not been identified on the 1911 census.

 

He enlisted before the war in Dublin on 10th March 1914 in the 1st Royal Dublin Fusiliers with the regimental number 8464.

 

He entered the Balkans theatre of war (Gallipoli) on 15th May 1915.  On 1st January 1916 the battalion was evacuated to Egypt, arriving on the 08th March. On 13th March 1916 they sailed from Port Said to Marseilles and onward to the Western Front.

 

Patrick deserted from the B.E.F. on 20th January 1917 while on leave (per Police Gazette).  The reason for his desertion or absence is not known but he re-enlisted five weeks later in Seaforth, Liverpool joining the 18^th Battalion of The King’s Liverpool Regiment as Private No 202830, using the alias  James Conway, on 27th February 1917, giving his home town as Birmingham.

 

After he had already re-enlisted under an alias, his name appeared in the list of Deserters and Absentees in the Police Gazette on 13th March 1917, with identifying details: born in St. Kevin’s Parish, Dublin, age 24, 5’ 5 and a half inches tall, with brown hair, grey eyes, and a scar under his chin;  occupation carter. 

 

He was listed as Wounded in the Birmingham Daily Post on 7th September 1917:

“King’s (Lpool R.) Conway 202830 J. (Birmingham)”.  

The battalion war diary records 46 O.R. wounded on 31st July, the first day of the Third Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele), and 177 O.R. wounded in August.  He evidently recovered from his wounds and returned to the front.

He was killed in action on the 22^nd September, 1917 whilst stringing wire with 7 others during the Third Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele). He was 23 years of age.  

18^th Battalion War Diary for 22nd September 1917

Enemy shelled intermittently.  Found working parties to Front Line, Wiring and Digging.

Casualties. Killed

17076 Sergt D Malcolm

203094 Pte G Fearon

57694 Pte B Brearley

202830 Pte J Conway

57784 Pte W Elliott

203179 Pte N. Williams

He now rests at Torreken Farm Cemetery No 1, Belgium where the inscription on his headstone reads:

“NOT FORGOTTEN BY HIS LOVING BROTHERS AND SISTERS R.I.P.” 

Wytschaete was taken by the Germans early in November 1914, and was recovered by Commonwealth forces during the Battle of Messines on 7 June 1917, but fell into German hands once more on 16 April 1918. The village was retaken for the last time on 28 September.  The cemetery, begun by the 5th Dorset Regiment in June 1917 and used as a front line cemetery until April 1918, contains 90 Commonwealth burials of the First World War and 14 German war graves.

His name appeared in the list of K.L.R. Killed published in the Weekly Casualty List on 23rd October 1917:  

 

 

Mr. M. McCabe (likely his brother Michael), 6 North Gloucester Place, Dublin, provided information for Patrick’s CWGC headstone.

 

His Army effects and War Gratuity of £3 were shared among his brother Leo McCabe (crossed out), sister-in-law Elizabeth Forrest, brothers Michael, Thomas, and George, and sisters Mary and Esther.

 

The pension card in the name of his sister Mary Jane, Mrs. M.J. O’Neill, 15 Grenville Street, Dublin, does not indicate that a pension was awarded.  

 

His name was struck off the medal rolls as having deserted, another medal roll shows “fraudulently enlisted”, but his name was resubmitted and his medals reissued.

 

Patrick is commemorated on Ireland’s National Roll of Honour