Peasants to Puddles
My Family History - By Nicky Rowberry

Harry Farr - Private 13852

This page is dedicated to the memory of Harry Farr who died on 15th November 1915 in Gallipoli.

Harry Farr was born in 1889 at Beech in Swynnerton, Staffordshire to John Farr & Sarah Jane nee Capewell. He died on 15th November 1915 in Gallipoli, one of the many millions of men who lost their lives in World War 1. It seemed sad for him to have died and all but these bare facts remembered, so I've tried to find out at least a little about his life until his untimely death aged just 26.

Harry Farr (Henry Farr on his birth certificate) was born on 12th October 1889 in Swynnerton, the 5th child John & Sarah Jane Farr who had married in 1880. In the 1891 census, the family are still living at Beech in Swynnerton. John is working as a gamekeeper and Sarah Jane has 5 small boys to look after!

By 1901 the family are living at Cotes Lodge in Cotes Heath. John is still working as a gamekeeper and the 2 oldest boys have moved out, presumably employed elsewhere by then. No occupation is given for Harry, he was presumably still at school aged 11. By 1911, Harry had followed in his father's footsteps and become a gamekeeper too. He was still living at home (by now in Gosdale, Stone) with his parents and 2 younger siblings. The table below gives a transcription from the 1911 census.

World War 1 broke out at the end of July 1914 and at some point Harry Farr must have enlisted. Unfortunately his army service records have not survived (over half the WW1 service records were destroyed by a bombing raid in WW2), so there is little direct evidence of his military time. However the records have survived for another soldier in the same battalion who is buried in the same cemetery as Harry. Private Albert Halbard had the regimental number 14159, which is not much higher than Harry's, suggesting perhaps that they enlisted roughly the same time. Albert Halbard's records show that he enlisted in early 1914, so perhaps Harry joined up early in September too?

The Commonwealth War Graves Commission website revealed Harry was a private in the 7th Battalion of the North Staffordshire Regiment and that his service number was 13852. It also states that he is commemorated at the Hill 10 Cemetery in Turkey. I can't reproduce the CWGC photo of the cemetery, but to see his page please click here. You can now look at the Medal Roll cards from the first world war online. These show a soldier's name, rank and what medals they were entitled to. Due to copyright issues, I don't think I can reproduce the image of the medal card, so instead I've transcribed it.

The index card indicates that he would have been entitled to three medals. The British Medal was awarded to servicemen who served in a theatre of war between 5th August 1914 and 11th November 1918. The Victory Medal (Allied Victory Medal) was awarded for service in any operational theatre over the same time frame. The Star was awarded to all those who served in any theatre of war against Germany between 5th August 1914 and 31st December 1915. On the back of his medal card it states that "Mrs Cooke (his remarried widow) makes application on behalf of Pte H. Farr for his 1914-1915 Star. 21-1-19". This suggests that for some reason he wasn't initially awarded it, although he had clearly served in 1915 as that was when he died at Gallipoli. The medal card also makes it clear that he died of his wounds, rather than being killed outright during the action.

In theory you can now look at the War Diaries for regiments in WW1, which can give a real insight into what the men went through. War Diaries were kept as a daily record of operations, intelligence reports and anything else that was going on for a given battalion. Unfortunately the diary for the month of November 1915 for Harry's battalion is missing. But descriptions online suggest the 7th battalion left the UK in June 1915 and sailed for Alexandria and then Gallipoli by mid July 1915. Harry married Bertha Whitehall in the first half of 1915, so they could only have been married for a matter of months before he was shipped out and she never saw him again.

It seemed to take a while for news of Harry Farr's death to reach the UK, but eventually it was reported in newspapers with daily casualty lists all round the country in December 1915. This one is from the Birmingham Daily Post. (Image © Reach PLC. Image created courtesy of THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. Image reproduced with kind permission of The British Newspaper Archive (www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk). Click www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk to see the full page from the newspaper.

The final documentation of Harry's life is the Army Register of Soldier's Effects. These registers show what monies were owing to the soldier at the time of his death - in the case of Harry it amounted to 6.12s.4d. His widow also received a War Gratuity of £4.10s. By any standard it doesn't seem much for her husband's life.

Harry was buried in Hill 10 Cemetery in Suvla Bay, Turkey. I found this photo of his gravestone on Gallipoli, 1915 Facebook page - (apologies I don't know who took the original photo, but I would be happy to credit them or remove the photo if they prefer). The family had chosen a personal inscription for the stone "WE GRUDGE NOT A LIFE IF IT GIVE LARGER LIFE UNTO THEM THAT LIVE".

He is also commemorated on the Stone war memorial and possibly on the Christ Church School memorial in Stone too.

It would be really nice to find a photo of Harry Farr to complete his story. He had a lot of siblings, many of whom have descendants, so hopefully someone out there has a photo. Please do get in touch by emailing me at n.rowberry@btinternet.com

In researching Harry's final days, several sites have been invaluable, so I've included links to some of them here.

The Commonwealth War Graves Commission is a great site to start with to give you the basic details you would need to then start digging deeper:

The National Archives at Kew now hold a huge number of records, many of which are available online, but it is well worth a visit down there if you can make it:

The British Newspaper Archive holds digitised images of newspapers from all over Britain. New pages are added weekly and it can be a great way of adding to your research:

If any of the above is of further interest, please feel free to contact me at: n.rowberry@btinternet.com

© Nicky Rowberry 2023

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Peasants to Puddles - My Family History. By Nicky Rowberry