Pte 49217 Edward Baines

Edward Baines was born in June 1887 at Force Forge, Satterthwaite, Ulverston, Cumberland and baptized on 10th July 1887. His parents were Egton Cum Newland born general labourer John Baines and his Bootle, Cumberland born wife Hannah (nee Myers). They had 10 children 5 boys and 5 girls with Edward being their 10th and last.

His mother died aged 41 in 1888 when Edward was aged 1.

 

In June 1890 in Argyle Street, Ulverston an Arthur Stanley Jefferson was born and lived there a short while. John Baines may have known the Jeffersons and their children.  Stanley later became Stan Laurel of Laurel and Hardy Fame.

 

The 1891 Census shows Edward aged 3 still living at Force Forge, Satterthwaite, Ulverston with his widowed father shown as a Wood Carter and eldest sibling, his sister Jane aged 20 as the Housekeeper with the other siblings.

 

The 1901 Census shows Edward as aged 15 and a scholar  at the same address and family set up.

 

By 1911 Census Edward is shown as working as a General Farm Labourer at Beck Side, Colton.

 

In the September quarter of 1913 he marries Ulverston born Dorothy Maggie Hird in Ulverston and on 21 July 1914 their son, Allan, is born in Ulverston. 

 

In September 1914 Edward enlisted in Dalton as Private. 23556 into the Royal Lancaster Regiment. Sometime in 1917 he is transferred into the 18th (Pals) Battalion of The King's Liverpool Regiment as Private 49217.

 

On 26th April 1918 he was killed in action. 

The Battalion diary gives an insight into the events of the day:

4am Battalion left OTTAWA CAMP and took up defensive positions in farmhouse (MILLE KAPELLEKEN FM) Companies dug in. Area shelled during the day with 150 cm & H.V. guns & enemy planes were active.

7pm Battalion withdrew to OTTAWA CAMP. Trenches shelled as Coys were moving off.

1 O.R. Killed

Edward was the Other Rank referred to and he now rests at Perth Cemetery,  Zillebeke V1 J 8 Belgium.

The cemetery was begun by French troops in November 1914 (the French graves were removed after the Armistice) and adopted by the 2nd Scottish Rifles in June 1917. It was called Perth (as the predecessors of the 2nd Scottish Rifles were raised in Perth), China Wall (from the communication trench known as the Great Wall of China), or Halfway House Cemetery. The cemetery was used for front line burials until October 1917 and contained 130 graves. It was not used again until after the Armistice, when graves were brought in from the battlefields and smaller cemeteries around Ypres.  There are now 1,426 WW1 Commonwealth burials in the cemetery.

 

A Pension was paid to his son Allan until his 16th birthday at 1 Atkinson Yard, Dalton in Furness.

 

His Widow Dorothy remarried in June quarter of 1921 to John Rowlandson They have 2 girls and a boy.