WW1 Casualties S-Z

Harper Seed

Harper Seed was born in Sheffield in 1889, the middle child of three born to George Alfred Seed and his second wife Mary, nee Harper. He also had a half-brother and two half-sisters from his father's first marriage.

The family lived at Woodside, Abbeydale Road (South) before moving to Drayton House, 23 Devonshire Road (Mary was from Market Drayton, Shropshire). George was the managing director of John Hall and Sons, sugar merchants of Granville Hill, Sheffield and was well known in music circles in Sheffield and north Derbyshire as a choir conductor and baritone singer.

Harper inherited his father's musical talents. He was a fine pianist who had been successful at the Royal Academy of Music attaining the degree of A.R.A.M. He was also a composer whose work, it was said, showed originality and feeling. By 1911 he was described as a sub-professor at the Academy.

He joined Sheffield University Officer Training Corps and received his commission as 2nd Lieutenant, 17th Battalion of the Notts and Derby Regiment (the Sherwood Foresters) on 8 November 1915. He went to France in September 1916 and took part in much hard fighting on the Somme. The report from his commanding officer stated that he was killed on the 20 September "in the final stage of a big attack just as victory crowned his efforts. The men whom he led loved him". He had been the organiser of a popular concert party called The Tivolis and had only rejoined his battalion from leave in England a month before his death. He was aged 26.

Second Lieutenant Harper Seed is buried in the Dunhallow Advanced Dressing Station Military Cemetery, near Ypres, Belgium and is also remembered on the War Memorial Tablet in the entrance hall to Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. London. 

James Talent

James Talent was born in Highfield, Sheffield on 6 April 1896 the fifth of nine children born to Walter Joseph Talent, a bolt and nut manufacturer and his wife Maud, nee Nowlin. The family were living at 40 Kearsley Road when James was baptized at St Barnabas Church on 22 April 1896 but had moved to 191 South View Road by 1901. The were living at 48 Thompson Road, close to the Botanical Gardens in 1911 but moved to Lingrow, 2 Busheywood Road before the war started.

James enlisted in the 8th Battalion, York and Lancaster Regiment at Pontefract on 7 December 1915. His training was done at Rugeley Camp, Cannock Chase, Staffordshire. On 27 May 1916 he sailed from Folkestone to Boulogne and reached his Battalion in the Somme on 23 June. On 1 July 1916 they were given the order to attack the German army near the village of Ovillers-la-Boiselle. Immediately after leaving the trenches they came under heavy machine gun fire and James was killed. He was aged 20. The 8th Battalion took 23 officers and 680 men into the attack that day of whom only 68 survived.

Private James Talent is buried at the Adanak Military Cemetery, Miraumont, France. His older brothers Walter (1888-1965), Harry (1891-1942) and Jack (1892-1956) all served their country in the Great War and are listed on the Roll of Honour inside St. John's Church.

John William Stone

John William Stone was born in Totley on 24 August 1892, the ninth of twelve children born to John William Stone senior and his wife Bertha nee Blackwell who had married at St. Lawrence Church, Eyam on 5 August 1877.

Their first child Mary was born in Eyam in 1878 but soon after they went to live in Curbar with John's parents, Rowland and Mary Stone. Further children followed: Eliza (1879), Joseph Blackwell (1881), Clara (1883), Annie (1884), Frances (1886) and Emma (1889).

John senior had been a stonemason until around 1885 when he became a gamekeeper employed by the Duke of Rutland on his Longshawe Estate. The Stone family moved to live at the the Duke's Bole Hill Lodge, Totley Bents in 1890. Four children were born in Totley: Martha (1890), John William (1892), Frederick (1894) and George (1897) and in all eight of the children attended Totley Church School, including John junior.

The Stone family then moved to Thickwood Lodge, the Duke's large hunting lodge at Owler Bar where their twelfth child Albert was born in 1900. Bertha Stones died there in September 1907 at the age of 50. She was buried at Eyam with Mary, her eldest daughter, who had died on 5 January 1899 at the age of 21. John senior had retired by the next census in 1911 and was living at Stanton Ford Farm, Curbar, with four of his children: John junior, Emma, Fred and Albert. Young John had become a farm labourer working on the Duke's estate.

On 10 February 1916 he joined the 2nd/6th Battalion (Sherwood Foresters) Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire Regiment and was stationed in Ireland during the Easter Rebellion of April 1916. Later he was sent to France and was killed in action on 27 April 1917 aged 24. Private John William Stone is buried at Templeux-le-Guerard British Cemetery, Somme, France and is commemorated on the war memorial at All Saints Church, Curbar. His effects were left to Elsie Gregory of Calver to whom he was engaged. Her older brother Walter married John's sister Emma in 1918.

Harold Todd

Harold Todd was born in 1891, the younger child of Thomas Wilkinson Todd and his first wife Annie Ada, nee Bell. His parents were natives of Bradford, West Yorkshire and had been living there with their one year old daughter, Louisa, in April 1891, but had moved to Sheffield by the time Harold was born later that year. Harold's mother died on 6 October 1900 and was buried at Christ Church, Dore.

In the census of the following year, the Todd family were living at Fairfield, Totley Rise (possibly 5 Glover Road) and Thomas had taken up a position as cashier for the Corporation Tramways. On 23 June 1903 he married Jessie Willis at Dore & Totley Union Church but further misfortune fell less than two year later when Jessie died. She was buried at Ecclesall on 15 March 1905.

In 1907 Harold's father married for a third time to Annie Ethel Bagshaw also at Dore & Totley Union Church where she was the accompanyist. Harold was educated at the Central Secondary School, Sheffield. By 1911 the family were living at Newlands, 22 Chatsworth Road and Harold had become a bank clerk with the London, City and Midland Bank in Church Street, Sheffield.

He enlisted on 11 September 1914 in the 12th Battalion (The Sheffield Pals) York and Lancaster Regiment. His first overseas posting was to Egypt to defend the Suez Canal. The 12th Battalion embarked aboard the HMT Nestor at Devonport on 20 December 1915 and arrived at Alexandria on 1 January 1916. The expected Turkish invasion failed to materialise and so on 10 March 1916 the Battalion left Port Said aboard HMT Briton bound for Marseilles, France on their way to join up with the British Expeditionary Force on the Somme. They travelled by train to Pont Remy, near Abbeville and then marched to Bertrancourt arriving on 29 March 1916. They went into the trenches a few days later.

On 4 May 1916 Harold received a slight wound to the leg which was attended to and he felt fit enough to make his own way to the rear. He stopped to talk to some friends in a dug-out when a shell burst close to them killing six men and wounding a further three. Harold was wounded again, this time more seriously. His wounds were again dressed as well could be done at the time and he was carried back to a dressing station where he died from loss of blood. Private Harold Todd was buried at the Sucrerie Miltary Cemetery, Colincamps, France.

Charles and Bernard Turner

This was the only Totley family to lose two sons during WW1, both in 1917.
Charles and Bernard were sons of Charles and Hannah Turner who lived in what is now the Old Orchard on Hillfoot Road. The house where the family lived for three generations was a small cottage and still stands, although now part of a much larger property.

Their grandparents were Edward and Keturah Turner who married in the spring of 1849, Edward recorded as both agricultural worker and cordwainer (shoemaker), and Keturah as a laundress. Edward died in 1880 leaving Keturah with her daughter born prior to their marriage, and three other children, the youngest of which was Charles aged 15, known as Charlie, and who would become the father of Charles and Bernard who died in the war.

In 1881 Charlie was an errand boy but ten years later he was recorded as a scythe smith, a common trade in Totley as the mills on Old Hay Brook had been used for this purpose during the 19th century. However, by the end of the Victorian era these were becoming derelict or had been converted to farm use, so it was possible that he would have been working at Abbeydale Works, now the Hamlet.

In 1890 he married Hannah Bingham from Dore with Arthur, the first of their five children, being born in October of that year. There still exists an indenture dated 10 June 1895 in which Keturah gives the cottage and land to Charlie....

"in consideration of the natural love and affection of the said Keturah Turner for her son the said Charles Turner".

Hannah died in 1903 leaving her young family ranging from age 2 to 12, including Charles junior (aged 10), and Bernard (aged 5). She is buried at Christ Church, Dore. Their grandmother Keturah lived on until 1907, dying at the age of 82.
Born on 16 August 1892, Charles Turner junior was at Totley All Saints School from September 1898 until leaving at the age of almost 13 to begin work. He is recorded as a scythe smith, like his father, in the 1911 census and still living at home.

He enlisted in the Royal Marine Light Infantry as Private PO/1399(S), although his records are lost and dates unknown. He was killed on 17 February 1917, aged 24, on the western front south of Arras in France and is buried at Queens Cemetery Bucquoy in Grave Reference I.J.5.

Born in early January 1898, the school records for Bernard Turner have not been found but he is recorded in the 1911 census as a scholar. He is named as one of the children in the Pageant of King Ecgbert, performed in 1909, and written by Mrs Sarah Milner, the mother of Roy Denzil Pashley Milner, another of the men named on Totley War Memorial.

Bernard's service records have survived and give us details such as:

Date of enlistment-- 13 September at Chesterfield. Pte. No. 01896
Age-- 18 years 9 months
Height-- 5 ft 3 3/4 inches
Chest fully expanded-- 32 1/2 inches
Occupation-- wood working machinist
Regiment-- Royal Scots 2/8th Battalion

Robert Saxelby Vine

Robert Saxelby Vine was born in Sheffield on 5 March 1891, the only son of George Robert Vine junior and his wife Alice nee Saxelby who had married at the Zion Congregational Church, Sheffield on 29 March 1888. An older sister Edith died at home at 10 Ranby Road, Hunter's Bar on 13 February 1899 aged 10.

Robert's grandfather, George Robert Vine senior came to Sheffield in 1865 where he set up a business as a stay and crinoline maker and devoted his spare time to microscopic studies of the minerals and fossils of the local carboniferous deposits. He had 67 papers published in scientic journals and was a founder member and first president of the Sheffield Microscopical Society. His son and namesake became a teacher at the Carbrook and Darnall Schools before attending Glasgow University. He then took a B.Sc. degree at London University and became a class teacher at Sheffield Central Schools. Robert's father was appointed headmaster of the Hunter's Bar Schools and then, for 17 years until his retirement in 1923, headmaster of Huntsmen's Garden Schools in Attercliffe.

Young Robert was also academically bright and was awarded a bursary to Sheffield's Central Secondary School in 1905. He passed his matriculation examinations for Sheffield University in 1907 and obtained a Class II B.A. Degree with Honours in History in 1913. The following year he gained a Masters degree and was awarded the Gladstone prize in political economy. In September 1915, he was appointed to the staff of the Sir Andrew Judd Commercial School, Tonbridge, Kent.

Owing to defective eyesight he was three times refused admission to the Army but in December 1915 a fourth offer of service was accepted and he received a commission in the 1st Battalion of the Cambridgeshire Regiment. On Christmas Eve 1915 Robert married Elsie Palmer, the daughter of Mr and Mrs James Palmer of Fern Bank, at Dronfield Baptist Church.

Ordered to the front in August 1916 Robert spent only eight weeks in the trenches before being killed in action on 14 October. He was aged 25. Second Lieutenant Robert Saxelby Vine M.A. is commemorated on Pier and Face 16 B of the Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France. He is also remembered at the Judd School in Tonbridge and at Cemetery Road Baptist Church, Sheffield. At the start of the war Robert's parents lived at 27 Broomhall Place, Sheffield but later they moved to Inglewood, 40 Main Avenue, Totley.

Graham Stuart Ward

At recent Armistice Day services, a relative has placed placed small crosses on Totley War Memorial in memory of their ancestor who died in World War I. We thought we would see if we could find out more about him. 

Graham Stuart Ward was born in Heeley on 30 March 1881, the youngest of twelve children born to William Ward and his wife Elizabeth (nee Blythman).  Graham's father had a number of occupations including an iron and steel manufacturer's clerk and cashier before setting up business as William Ward and Company, umbrella rib manufacturers of Bernard Lane in the Park District of Sheffield. The family moved home location frequently but for much of the time that Graham lived in England the family were at 40 Oxford Street, Crookesmoor. There may be a connection with Dore and Totley as Graham's brother Norman married into the Fearnehough family in 1902. 

When his father died in 1903 the umbrella business was sold. With all of his surviving siblings married or moved away, Graham sailed from Liverpool on 25 March 1903 aboard the Allan Line Numidian bound for Halifax, Nova Scotia with the intention of joining his brothers Frank and Edgar who had emigrated to Canada in April 1894. Their mother joined them there the following year accompanied by her niece Marguerite Marie Beecher. Graham's married sister Violet and brother Harold were soon to follow with their families. By the 1906 Census the Ward family were in Mackenzie, Saskatchewan and by 1911 they had moved to Humboldt in the same Province. Graham had become a farmer. His mother died on 26 October 1914 when the Wards were living at Hilliers Crossing, Vancouver Island, British Columbia.

On 17 September 1915 Graham signed attestation papers to join the Canadian Over-Seas Expeditionary Force. He belonged to the Active Militia but he had no previous military experience and was unmarried. He joined the 72nd Battalion, the Seaforth Highlanders, who embarked for Britain on 26 April 1916. They arrived in France on 13 August. They were drafted into the 16th Battalion of the Canadian Infantry on the Somme and Graham was reported killed in action on or around 4 September 1916, aged 35.

Private Graham Stuart Ward is buried in the London Cemetery Extension, High Wood, Longueval, France along with 3,871 other Commonwealth soldiers.

Frank Walter Warmsley

Frank Warmsley was born in Chesterfield on 2 February 1898, the only child of Walter Leonard Warmsley and his wife Agnes Ann, nee Seddon. Frank's father was the clerk, rate collector and assistant overseer for the Board of Guardians of the Ecclesall Bierlow Union (which included Dore & Totley) for over 35 years.

The family were living at 101 South View Crescent, Highfield in 1901 but had moved to 58 Everton Road, Endcliffe by 8 September 1903 when Frank was admitted to the infants department of Hunter's Bar School. He left the school on 15 May 1905 but no details are given of his later schooling. Frank became an employee of the Sheffield Banking Company, at first in George Street, Sheffield and later at their branch in Rotherham. The Warmsley family had moved home to Brentwood, King Ecgbert Road by 1916.

Frank joined the King's Liverpool (Scottish) Regiment as a private in August 1916 and went into training at Park Hall Camp, Oswestry, Shropshire. On 7 April 1917 her entered the 12th Cadet Officer's Training Battalion School at Newmarket, Suffolk, and on 10 August that year he obtained his commission and was transferred to the Sherwood Foresters (Notts and Derbys Regiment).

He left for France on 19 September and died on 22 November 1917 at No. 7 Casualty Clearing Station from a bullet wound he had received on returning from patrol. He was 19 years of age. Second Lieutenant Frank Walter Warmsley is buried at Noeux-les-Mines Communial Cemetery Extension, near Béthune, France.

Henry Edwards Wingfield

Henry Edwards Wingfield was born on 14 August 1896 in Crookes, Sheffield the only son from William Henry Wingfield's second marriage. His father had previously married Eliza Keyworth Gilson in Crookes in 1875 but she had died childless and been buried in Ecclesfield on 24 February 1890. Henry had four sisters from his father's second marriage to Louisa Ruth Edwards in Bexley, Kent in 1892.

William was a partner in the cutlery manufacturing business of Wade, Wingfield and Rowbotham of Tenter Street, Sheffield. The family had lived in Crookes and Woodhouse but when the business was taken over by Thomas Turner & Sons, William retired and the family moved to Devonshire Road, Dore. By the time of the 1911 Census the Wingfields were living at Brookside, 144 Totley Brook Road but Henry was away at boarding school in Southport, Lancashire; his aunt Sarah lived in nearby Birkdale.

Henry's father died on 12 March 1914 and was buried at Ecclesfield two days later. Henry's mother then took his sisters to live with their grandmother, Amelia Victoria Edwards, at Lullington Cottage, Bexley but Henry remained in Sheffield.

On 28 November 1914 he had attempted to enlist in the 4th (Hallamshire) Battalion of the York and Lancaster Regiment but was found to be under age and was discharged the following day. A week after reaching the age of 19, Henry signed attestation papers for the 12th Battalion, York and Lancaster Regiment in Sheffield. He was living at 76 Archer Road, Millhouses and had become an engineer's apprentice.

Henry was transferred to the 15th Battalion which on 5 April 1916 sailed to France to join the British Expeditionary Force. Henry was killed in action on 22 July later that year. We have been unable to find a report of how he died. Private Henry Edwards Wingfield is buried at Rue-du-Bacquerot No. 1 Military Cemetery, Laventie, France.

Selby Wolstenholme

Selby Wolstenholme was born in Totley on 25 January 1886, the only son of Selby Wolstenholme senior, a scythe smith at Totley Rolling Mill, and his first wife Rachel Moore nee Toulson who had married in Attercliffe on Christmas Eve 1882. Selby junior had an older sister Nellie who was born on 7 April 1883 but sadly his mother and his new born sister Sarah both died when he was aged just one. Rachel Wolstenholme was buried at Christ Church, Dore on 7 August 1887. She was aged 24. Strangely there is no mention of daughter Sarah in the Dore parish baptisms or burials.

In the 1891 Census Selby senior was still living at Totley Rolling Mill with his parents and daughter Nellie whilst his son was recorded as a "nurse child" of the Laws family who were their close neighbours. Selby junior was admitted to Totley Church School on 17 August 1891 aged 5 but unfortunately no date of leaving is recorded in the register.

His father married Mary Lowe at St. John's, Abbeydale on 20 November 1895. They had a daughter, Mabel, who was baptized at the same church on 15 March 1897. By 1900 they had moved to 63 Baslow Road, Totley Rise where Mary and Selby ran a drapery shop and the following year they took over the Post Office business which had been established a couple of years earlier at number 71. Young Selby became an apprentice butcher living with Colin Thompson at number 69.

On 2 November 1909 Selby junior married Nellie Sprentall at Rotherham Parish Church and soon after the couple moved to Dore to run a butcher's shop which Colin Thompson had established at Greenwood Mount. Selby enlisted in the 2nd Battalion (Sherwood Foresters) Notts and Derby Regiment. His service record unfortunately has not survived. What we know is that he served in France and Flanders and was reported wounded on 20 November 1917.

He rejoined his Battalion and was presumed to have been killed in action near St. Quentin between 17 and 19 September 1918. He was aged 32. Private Selby Wolstenholme is buried in the Chapelle British Cemetery at Holnon, France. He is also remembered on the family gravestone in Dore churchyard.

Samuel Wright

Samuel Wright was born in Totley in 1883, the tenth of fourteen children born to Levi Wright and his wife Ann Elizabeth, nee Pickering who had married in 1869.

At first they lived with Ann's widowed father Edward Pickering who farmed 23 acres at Piper House, Dore Moor. Levi was a coal miner like his father James Wright who had come to live at Dore after his marriage to Elizabeth Law in 1847. The couple had six children at Piper House: Elizabeth Ann (1870), Joseph (1871), Lilly (1872), Albert Edward (1873), Lucy (1875) and Clarissa (1876).

Following Edward Pickering's death in 1877, the farm stock, carts, equipment and house furnishings were put up for sale on 18 March 1878 and Levi, Ann and their five surviving children (Lilly died in her first year) moved to Totley Forge House, Oldhay. Three more children were born who died in their infancy, Hannah Maria (1878-79), Thomas Arthur (1880-80) and Lillie (1880-80) before Samuel Wright was born on 15 February 1883. Another four children were born subsequently: Ernest (1885), Hilda (1887-1890) Levi junior known as Jack (1888) and Gladys (1891).

In all nine of the children attended Totley Church School, Samuel being admitted on 29 September 1887 aged 4. By the time of the 1891 Census, Levi Wright senior had become a labourer in a brickyard, possibly at Moor Edge and Lucy and Joseph had left home. Elizabeth Ann died unmarried in 1893 aged 23. T

he 1901 Census records that the remaining six children were still living with the parents at Totley Forge. Their mother Ann was shown as a laundress so perhaps money was becoming tight for the Wright family. Ernest had become a filer in an engineers shop and Samuel, aged 18, was a joiner. Albert, who had become a railway labourer, died soon after in May 1901, the seventh of the Wright children to die.

Before the next Census in 1911 Samuel had emigrated to New Zealand. He joined the 4th Battalion New Zealand Rifle Brigade and fought on the Somme. Samuel was killed in action on 15 September 1916 in the Battle of Flers-Courcelette, when the village was entered by the New Zealand and 41st Divisions behind tanks, the innovative new weapons that were used here for the first time. He was aged 33.

Corporal Samuel Wright is buried at Bulls Road Cemetery, Flers, Somme. He is commemorated on the Auckland Museum Memorial and on the Wright family gravestone in Dore churchyard.