Tharston Past

George Harry Gordon Dye (19/3/1891) OSH 1899 – 1902 Harry Dye was killed in action aged 26 on 21 November 1917. He was born in Tharston, South Norfolk, the younger son of miller George Arthur Dye and Ellen Ann (née Horstead). On the outbreak of war Harry is teaching at Bracondale School in Norwich, but enlists with one of the University and Public Schools Battalions of the Royal Fusiliers, and is soon promoted to Corporal. He goes to France in November of 1915, and is commissioned Lieutenant with the 9th Battalion of the Norfolk Regiment the following year. Harry Dye died at Casualty Clearing Station No. 21 near Bapaume on 21 November 1917 from wounds received the previous day when he had gone over the top with his Colonel. He had been acting as intelligence officer to the Battalion for some time, and had been engaged in mapping the village of Ribécourt prior to the attack. The Colonel wrote in tribute that “He was an exceedingly clever young fellow, with a big sense of duty, and absolutely fearless.” Despite impoverishment, Mrs Dye subscribes to the Gresham’s war memorial fund in 1919. Harry Dye is remembered on the Nottingham war memorials of St. Giles’ Church, and Junction & Bridgford Road, as well as that of Bracondale School in Norwich. He is buried in the cemetery at Rocquigny-Equancourt Road, Manancourt, in the Somme.

Etricourt was occupied by Commonwealth troops at the beginning of April 1917 during the German withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line. It was lost on the 23 March 1918 when the Germans advanced, but regained at the beginning of September.

The cemetery was begun in 1917 and used until March 1918, mainly by the 21st and 48th Casualty Clearing Stations posted at Ytres, and to a small extent by the Germans, who knew it as "Etricourt Old English Cemetery". Burials were resumed by Commonwealth troops in September 1918 and the 3rd Canadian and 18th Casualty Clearing Stations buried in it in October and November 1918.

The cemetery contains 1,838 Commonwealth burials and commemorations of the First World War. 20 of the burials are unidentified and nine Commonwealth graves (6 of which were made by the Germans) which cannot now be found are represented by special memorials. The cemetery also contains 198 German war burials and the graves of ten French civilians.

The cemetery was designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield.

Young Harry is boarding with his aunt Marion, a schoolteacher, in Holt, as the family live nearly forty miles away. The only references to his school career in the recently started Gresham Magazine are to his being awarded the third scholarship to Christ’s Hospital (the Blue Coat School) in Horsham, Sussex, the proud headmaster Howson noting that, “If the industry he had shown here was shown there, he was, as Shakespeare said, a made man.” Amongst his possessions were some prize books awarded for industry at the School. Christ’s Hospital was a charitable boarding foundation, originally founded for the poor orphan children of London, but accepting children from families in social, financial or other need by the time it had moved to Horsham. On Harry’s application form in July 1902 George senior states that he has a dependent mother-in-law to support, as well as another son. Harry is admitted on 21 January 1903 and stays until December of 1906. His discharge record shows that he has a good report, both for diligence and conduct, in all subjects, and, as a monitor, is awarded the ‘First Bible’, with superior binding. On leaving school Harry decides to go into the teaching profession, like both his mother and aunt, and the 1911 Census records him boarding with other teachers in Nottingham. He teaches at the Grammar School in West Bridgford, where he is popular and plays cricket for the local St. Giles’s Club and football for nearby Rushcliffe. The family, meanwhile, has fallen on hard times by 1911, with his father recorded as unemployed, and the household including a boarder who is a local headmistress.

At some stage Harry becomes engaged to Ethel Woolnough, who was never to marry, and kept the postcards he sent her for the rest of her life.

The newly built Chapel became a place of remembrance for the fallen. On the 6th of January, 1920, the Chapel Committee and the War Memorial Committee decided on the general plan for the stained glass windows and that the names of the fallen should be carved and gilded into six centre panels on the southern side as well as on memorial stalls. The tradition of the Chapel Service on the 11th of November at 11 a.m. was introduced in 1919 with two minutes of silence and the wearing of the poppy. This tradition still takes place today.

City of Peace window designed by Reginald Bell bearing the inscription ‘They whom this window commemorates were numbered among those who, at the call of King and Country, left all that was dear to them, endured hardness, faced danger and finally passed out of the sight of men by the path of duty and sacrifice, giving up their lives that others may live in freedom.  Let those who come after see to it that their names be not forgotten. 1914-1919.’

A new memorial for 2018: On Friday 9th November 2018 a new WWI memorial, the gift of the 2018 generation, was dedicated by Headmaster Douglas Robb during a special service of commemoration. The new limestone plaque, designed in the same style as the WWII memorial, includes the names of fallen OGs discovered during the Centenary who were not included on the original wooden board. Over £8,000 was raised to fund the new memorial thanks to the efforts of the Gresham’s Foundation, Old Greshamian Club, ex-head of music Angela Dugdale and other members of the School community. It was designed and built by stonemason Teucer Wilson – www.teucerwilson.co.uk

At the time of Harry’s death his parents are living in Yarmouth, on the Isle of Wight, and his mother writes pleadingly to the Army Council telling of their financial difficulties, as her husband has been very ill and therefore unable to work, saying, “My dear son always allowed us a weekly sum during his lifetime.” Harry leaves legacies of £10 to both his mother and brother, and his books, photographs, and desk to his fiancée Ethel, who also lost her own father in the War.

The above text has been included by kind permission of Nicholas Chapman - © 2023.