Captain Darrell Richard Jeffreys, Devonshire Rgt - was he attached to DCLI?

[A Lancashire Fusilier by Proxy]

In his diary, my grandfather Norman Hall mentions that on 14^th July 1915 Captain Jeffreys, a regular with the 1/6^th Durham Light Infantry, but then attached to the 2/5^th Lancashire Fusiliers as Adjutant, received a wire to say that his brother had been killed in France with the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry.

At the end of the published version of my grandfather's diary I am inserting a table to list the names of all those who did not survive whom my grandfather mentions, with details of their dates of death and burial/commemoration places.

I have been able to identify Captain Jeffreys, as Captain John William Jeffreys, son of Florence Hall Jeffreys and the late John Jeffreys of Canterton Manor, Lyndhurst, Hampshire, and the deceased brother as Captain Darrell Richard Jeffreys, who died on 11th July 1915 and is buried at Chester Farm Cemetery, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium. The CWGC website shows that he was aged 33 when he died, and was in the 1^st Battalion Devonshire Regiment. I therefore think that my grandfather has made an error in describing him as being in the “DCLI”, possibly confusing two West Country counties. However, I am wondering whether it is at all possible that he was attached to the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry. I could check the War Diaries, but, before I download these in bulk, does anyone happen to know whether it was more likely to have been the Duke of Devonshire’s Regiment or the Duke of Corwall’s Light Infantry that were engaged in action near Chester Farm on 11th July 1915?

[Kath]

Have you seen this?

https://imtheboy.wordpress.com/2009/06/07/captain-dr-jeffreys1st-bnthe-devonshire-regtkia-11-july-1915/

[Acknown]

The 1st Devons were in the 14th Infantry Brigade of the 5th Division. The Brigade War Diary (TNA via Ancestry: 1562/1-4) reports: '12 noon: 4.7 in guns firing over no 28 burst a couple of rounds short and the shelling hit the parapet, killing Captain Jeffreys and 2 other ranks and wounding three others.'

The Battalion WD (TNA via Ancestry: 1565) states that it was operating near Dickebusch at a place called Oosthoek, but I can't find it, that the officer was Captain DR Jeffreys '1st Devon Regt' and that the number of OR deaths was four.

Acknown

Edited 20 June , 2020 by Acknown

[A Lancashire Fusilier by Proxy]

Thanks, Kath, I hadn't seen that blog. I was thinking that the reference to "rejoining his unit" made it virtually certain that he was still with the Devonshires, when I received Acknown's post, which clinches it. All the more poignant that he was killed by "friendly fire". Thank you both.

[Acknown]

I think this thread shows the right Oosthoek.

Acknown