Hyde War Memorial Trust
Dedicated to the 710 men of Hyde who
gave their lives in the First World War.
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The Original 1921 Unveiling Brochure
Gallery. Images of and from Werneth Low
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Main Horace Bruckshaw page Pte. Horace Bruckshaw, of the Plymouth Battalion of the Royal Marine Light Infantry Horace was born on 28 June 1891 in Whitchurch, Salop and was the youngest of seven children. He followed his only brother to Whitchurch Grammar School. He commenced work as a trainee draughtsman and later joined the local unit of the Territorials - B Company, 4th Kings Shropshire Light Infantry. Horace's father died in 1912 from a painful form of cancer. About that time Horace found digs in the industrial town of Hyde and a job as a trainee manager in the cotton-spinning firm of Ashton Brothers, their mills being the largest in Hyde at that time. His sister, Bertha, was a teacher in a school in Hyde. By 1914, he had been promoted to assistant manager in charge of the Carding Department at Ashton's Middle Mill. He had also established a romantic friendship with Phoebe (Cis) Holliday, a friend of his sister, and there may have been an unofficial engagement between them when war broke out in August 1914. Cis is the Great-Aunt of Geoffrey Pickford who became the Treasurer of Hyde War Memorial Trust in 1976. Horace was one of the half million men who volunteered for the armed services in the first months of the war. He wrote two diaries. He embarked on the Braemar Castle at Devonport on 6 February 1915 and eventually took part in the Landings at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. He remained there until 7 May 1916 when he embarked on H.T.S. Briton and landed in Marseilles on 12 May 1916 in preparation for service on the Western Front. His diaries finish immediately prior to the Battle of Ancre on 13 November 1916 which he survived. Many men were sent home on leave shortly afterwards and during his first leave from foreign service for almost two years he married Phoebe Holliday about 19 December 1916. Later he returned to France and took part in the Battle of Arras that started on 9 April 1917. On 28 April 1917 the 2nd RMLI were given the task of capturing the German trenches around the ruins of a windmill near Gavrelle, a village between Arras and Douai. It was a bad day for the troops. One of the bodies left on the battlefield that day was that of Private Horace Bruckshaw. |
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