BALHG – Page 3 – Bergh Apton

Alfred Cubitt

ALFRED ALEC ARNOLD CUBITT
15534, Lance Sergeant
9th Battalion, Norfolk Regiment
Who died aged 25 on 26th September 1915
Remembered on the Loos Memorial, France

Family Background
Alfred was the son of Helen Jessie Cubitt and her husband Arthur who, at the time of the 1891 Census, lived on The Street (that then ran from Mill Road crossroads to th Rectory). He was born there and baptised in Bergh Apton parish church on 10th April 1890.

Military Service
By 1901 the family had moved to Ely and had returned to Arthur Cubitt’s home village of Syderstone by 1911, by which time Alfred was no longer living at home.

Subject to verification with the Royal Norfolk Regiment’s museum team it seems probable that by 1911, at the age of 21 years, he was already serving with the Norfolk Regiment because, four years later at the time of his death he had attanied the rank of Lance Sergeant.

Alfred’s “Kitchener Army” battalion was mostly untried troops and had been in the Front Line for only one day on 26th September 1915 when, as part of a battle known as “The Big Push” it joined in an attack on some German-held quarries to the north west of Hulluch.

The 9^th Norfolks’ objective was the village of Vendin-le-Vieil but the German fire on the advancing Norfolks was so severe that these relatively untried troops could make no progress.

Petre’s “History of the Norfolk Regiment 1914-1918” includes a description of this attack that began at 6.45 am. It was repulsed by heavy German fire that drove the attackers back to the shelter of old German trenches that offered little cover. They then retreated even further to British trenches where, nearly 12 hours after the attack began, they were relieved by the Grenadier Guards.

In this failed venture the 9th Norfolks suffered 209 casualties – a fierce baptism in which Alfred was amongst the 73 who died or were missing in action.

More Family Background
Alfred’s father Arthur Cubitt was a Groom/Coachman who, at the time of the 1891 Census, lived close to the Manor House. In the logical sequence of the Enumerator’s “walk” the family probably lived in the cottage adjacent to the Manor House.

The Manor imn the 1930s, a time when it had changed little since the time the Cubitts lived in Bergh Aptonb

If that is indeed the case he would have worked for Jane Deeker Denny, the Manor’s then owner.

His name is on the memorial wall of the cemetery at Dud Corner, Loos along with those of Bergh Apton boys Harry Mayes and Charles Weddup. It is also on the memorial at Syderstone in north Norfolk where his parents were living at the time of his death.

Victor Gillingwater

VICTOR GEORGE GILLINGWATER
CH/1473(S) Private
1st Battalion, Royal Marines Light Infantry
Who died aged 20 on 17th February 1917
Buried in the Queen’s Cemetery, Buquoy, France

Family Background

Victor’s father George Gillingwater in middle age

Victor was born in Mundham and was a woodman. He was the son of George and Mary Gillingwater who, at the time of Victor’s death, lived at Bussey Bridge in Bergh Apton and who are buried together in Bergh Apton’s churchyard.

Young Victor Gillingwater in a studio portrait in the possession of one of his great neices.

His enlistment papers describe him as being 18 years and 5 months old, 5 ft 5.5″ tall (1.66m) with a chest measurement of 35.5″ (0.90m) with brown eyes and dark brown hair.

Military Service
Victor went to London on 22 February 1916 to volunteer for the Royal Marines whose records show that the next Service No allocated – to the next man in the queue fo volunteers – was Victor’s neighbour Alfred Hubert Rope from Holly Farm, Bergh Apton. That cannot, surely, be a concidence and we may safely conclude that they travelled with the purpose of singning on together.

Thereafter they trained together to fight with the Royal Naval Division (RND) that was a fighting force on land made up of Royal Marines. Victor and Alfred were posted to 1RMLI (1st Battalion Royal Marines Light Infantry). In their early days of training they even got into disciplinary hot water together on one occasion. But the togetherness ended with Victor’s death. Within a few weeks, Alfred was dead too. Both were killed in battles that have become famous as RMLI endeavours.

We don’t know the background to this rather enigmatic comment by Mundham’s Rector on the endpaper of young Victor Gillingwater’s school Bible.

Victor was killed in the battle of Miraumont on 17th February 1917 in which his battalion set out from River Trench to attack a sunken road that ran north from Baillescourt Farm on the north bank of the River Ancre, close to the village of Grandcourt. The scene of this action was confused and the losses of 1RMLI were heavy. Many of the casualties may even have been the result of shots that fell short in the British “creeping barrage” as the Royal Marines advanced from River Trench towards the sunken road (that is still clearly identifiable and walkable today).

Members of a group from Bergh Apton Local History Group on the sunken road at Miraumont in 2008

Immediately following the battle Victor and other fatalities from this action were buried in a small cemetery to the rear of River Trench near Holland Wood (marked on Trench maps as Bois Hollande). In July 1919, they were re-buried in Queen’s Cemetery at Bucquoy, a few kilometers to the north of Miraumont.

More Familiy Background

Victor’s home in the 1920s with his parents in the garden and as it is today.

We were fortunate in 2008 to make contact with Victor’s family who have a studio portrait of him in uniform. Other personal items his parents passed down include a Bible given to him by the headmaster of his school in Mundham and a copy of Pilgrim’s Progress in which he signed his name and the words “Bergh Apton”.

His medals are now in the possession of Chris Johnson of Jays Cottage at Bussey Bridge, the house next door to May Cottage that was Victor’s home his parents and his sisters Florence and Violet.

September 20, 2018November 18, 2019

WW1 Commemoration project

Thirty seven men who died in the First World War (WW1) between 1914 and 1918 were born, baptised, educated or lived at some time in their short lives in Bergh Apton, and remembered on our war memorial.

The centennial Remembrance

On 26th October 2018, to honour their sacrifice and their place in Bergh Apton’s life, we erected thirty seven life-sized figures around the village as part of the Nation’s commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the 1918 Armistice that brought the fighting to an end.

Each figure represents one of Bergh Apton’s fallen and is in the military stance called “Resting on Arms Reversed”. It is a traditional attitude of respect and remembrance in which a soldier stands with his hands resting on the butt of his rifle that, turned upside down, rests on his right boot.

Where each figure stands

Each figure stands outside, or as near as possible to, the house where we know, from our research, that a man lived. They will remain in place until the end of November.

A map of locations through the village can be found here.

In the cases of three men we cannot be certain where they lived so the figures of Freeman Harber, Sidney Keeler and Reginald Mitchell stand at the old iron gates into the churchyard of the parish church, through which they will have passed at some time in their short lives.

A fouth figure stands with them bearing the words “FOR ALL THOSE WHO DIED 1914-1918”. He represents every man, every woman and every child, military or civilian, firend or for, who died in their many millions in the five years in whic this war raged throughout the world.

What the figure tells you

Each Bergh Apton man’s figure tells you his name, his age, his Regiment or Corps, the date and place he died and where he is remembered on a military war memorial or buried in a military war cemetery.

Thus each one bears limited but essential information. We know so much more about each man and will add it to the village website. You will find it by tapping a man’s name below.

The Bergh Apton Book of Remembrance

We included a copy of the Book of Remembrance kept in the Sanctuary of our parish church in which, as each year goes by, we turn the pages to mark the anniversary of each man’s death. Tap the up and down arrows at the foot of the Book’s image (below) and you can scroll through the story of the memorial and visit the page of each man – in the calendar order of the date of his death.

The work of Bergh Apton Local History Group

Research into Bergh Apton’s past is the objective of the Bergh Apton Local History Group (BALHG). Research into the village’s connections with the two World Wars and the men on our war memorial is led by village residents and former serving soldiers John Ling (Royal Norfolk Regiment 1957-1960) and Chris Johnson (Royal Corps of Transport 1972-1975).

Our Battlefield Tours

Many of the photographs that are published in each man’s story were taken when John, Chris and other members of BALHG undertook a five-year pilgrimage to Belgium and Northern France in a 17 seater minibus carrying the message “Bergh Apton Remembers”. The group visited every battlefield on which a Bergh Apton man died, and every War Cemeteries and War Memorial where our men are remembered. This pilgrimage was not limited to the First World War so it took in the World War Two (1939-1945) battlefields in Normandy and Italy where a younger generation of Bergh Apton soldiers, sailors and airmen are buried or remembered.

May they all rest in peace, their duty to this village and this Nation bravely done.

Book of Remembrance at is for Church - definitive

The key is as follows:
1. ALEXANDER, Walter           2. ANNIS, Arthur
3. BEAUMONT, Robert             4. BLIGH, Alfred
5. BOGGIS, Alfred                 6. BRACEY William
7. CARR, Leonard                    8. CUBITT, Alfred
9. DAVEY, Edward                   10. ETHERIDGE, Horace
11. EVERETT, Leonard    12. GILLINGWATER, Victor
13. GREENACRE, Henry        14. GREENACRE, Charles
15. HARBER, Freeman             16. HARVEY, Albert
17. HUNT, Ernest                         18. KEDGE, Sidney
19. KEELER, Sidney                  20. KING, Alfred
21. LEEDER, Ernest                   22. MACE, Albert
23. MARKS, Sydney       24. MAYES, Harry
25. MITCHELL, Reginald       26. PARKER, Albert
27. PRESTON, John                 28.   ROPE, Alfred
29. ROPE, Leonard                  30. STARMAN, William
31. STONE, Aubrey                  32. STONE Thomas
33. THROWER, Herbert       34. THROWER, Walter
35. WALL, Clement                36. WEDDUP, Charles
37. WRIGHT, James                38. ALL WHO DIED