1th Battalion Essex Regiment

[regbutler]

Pte Harry George Butler 47709 10th Battalion The Essex Regimet was killed 5th September 1918 and is on panel 7 of the Vis-En-Artois Memorial commemorating those killed from 8th August 1918 onwards. I have found out that the 10th was allocated to the 53rd Brigade of the 18th (Eastern)Division. Can anyone tell me what battle the 10th was engaged in on the 7th September 1918. It must have been one of the last Great Pushes towads Cambria.

Please forgive me if I have put this Topic in the wrong place.

Yours truly

Reg Butler

[GrahamC]

Hi Reg

According to 'The Long Long Trail' - here - the last Battle of the 53rd Brigade was The battle of Sambre (or Charleroi), 21-23 August 1914. - see here . However, as this site says: "At 11.00 pm on 23 August Lanrezac ordered the retreat. With their French allies in retreat, the BEF was also forced to pull back. The retreat would last for the next two weeks." - which covers the date your man was killed.

The SDGW database lists 19 men of 10/Essex who were k.i.a. or d.o.w. on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Sept. + Pte. Butler on the 5th, so some action must have been going on.

There will no doubt be an Essex expert along later with War Diary access.

Cheers

Graham

[connaughtranger]

Hi

!0th Essex was relieved on 5th Sept by the 9th Essex, having helped secure the crossings of the Canal du Nord and taken possesion of Riverside Wood. The next 10 days were spent in recuperation and training at Faviere Wood

Regards

Martin

[Stephen Garnett]

Hi Reg,

The 10/Essex were in action at the Canal de Nord on 4 September and having succesfully forced a crossing were relieved in the early hours of the morning of the 5th, being withdrawn by the 6th to Faviere Wood. On the 2 September they had attacked German trenches east of St Pierre Vaast Wood from positions on the Rancourt-Sailly-Saissel road and had contributed to a German withdrawal by the end of the day. On the 3rd they advanced through St Martin's Wood and were ordered to capture bridges across the Canal de Nord and River Tortille. Heavy artillery and machine-gun fire prevented this but by late on the 4th, the 10/Essex had managed to take and hold positions on the east bank of the canal before their relief.

If you would like transcripts of the War Diary for this period, please pm me with your email address.

Kind regards,

Steve Garnett

[Ed Woods]

Try and get a copy of 'With the 10th Essex in France' well worth a read to see some of the actions your ancestor participated in.