Battle of the Somme: Pudsey's Greatest Loss

The Battle of the Somme did not begin on 1st July 1916.

For communities such as Pudsey, Stanningley and Farsley, it had begun almost two years earlier, this is their story.

When Britain entered the First World War in August 1914,
the country faced an immediate shortage of trained manpower. Across the district, men volunteered in their hundreds, answering Lord Kitchener's call to serve. Others joined their local Territorial battalions, believing they would reinforce Britain's professional army rather than replace it.

During September 1914 the great Yorkshire "Pals" battalions were formed, including the 15th (Leeds Pals) and the 16th and later the 18th (Bradford Pals). These enthusiastic volunteers were ordinary civilians – clerks, mill workers, teachers, apprentices, shop assistants and sportsmen – who had little expectation of immediate front-line service. They required months of training and conditioning, much of it carried out on the Yorkshire moors at Colsterdale, whilst Britain's Regular Army fought the opening battles of the war.

Throughout 1915 those experienced regular soldiers endured the terrible fighting at Ypres, Loos and Gallipoli. Their losses were so severe that the volunteer battalions originally intended as reserves suddenly became Britain's next fighting army.

 

The 1915 Leeds Pals recruiting Tram Car

Back home in Pudsey
The war transformed everyday life. Shell production expanded onto an unprecedented industrial scale as factories across West Yorkshire worked around the clock, including the expanding Phoenix Dynamo Works at Thornbury.

Local women at the Phoenix Dynamo Munitions Canteen

 

Thousands of local women entered engineering and munitions work for the first time, while men employed in reserved occupations kept the railways, mills, mines and factories operating. Almost every family in the district found itself contributing to the war effort in some way, many sent comfort parcels, cigarettes and even cake to our lads.

The Leeds Pals returned in June 1915 visiting Pudsey with a recruiting Tram that took even more young men, and celebrated their local connections through exhibition games of cricket.

By the spring of 1916 Britain's citizen army was ready
The volunteers who had marched away from Pudsey less than two years earlier were now eager soldiers preparing for the largest British offensive yet attempted.

Our boys, our heroes
When the Somme offensive opened on 1 July 1916, it was not anonymous battalions advancing across the fields of Picardy. It was Pudsey's sons, Bradford's sons and Leeds' sons. For another 140 days, the communities that had raised them would watch in horror as casualty lists grew longer as the weeks dragged on, until scarcely anyone remained unaffected.

The scale of our local losses can only be compared to the entire 6 years of the Second World War. Below is a Roll of Honour of those that fell.

 

Coping with loss (or not)
The Battle of the Somme did not end for Pudsey when the fighting wound down in November 1916. For many families, the real struggle was only just beginning.

Major William Booth - England all rounder and Leeds Pal

One of the district's most celebrated sons was Major William Booth, the Yorkshire and England cricketer, former Fulneck School pupil and son of Pudsey's famous Booth family. A gifted sportsman and natural leader, Booth embodied everything the Leeds Pals represented. He was mortally wounded during the Somme fighting and died in the arms of fellow Yorkshire cricketer Abe Waddington. Back home, Booth's sister Annie refused to let go of hope, keeping Major's bedroom exactly as he had left it, believing that one day he might still return. Despite compassionate visits from Waddington she still kept a candle burning in his window as a beacon.

 

Major's grave at CWGC Serre Road N1 Cemetery

 

Like thousands of families across Britain, the Booths were left not only with grief, but with an empty chair and a future that would never be realised.

The loss of Private Charles Galloway Greaves
One of the Pudsey men who answered the Leeds Pals recruiting tram in June 1915, tells a different but equally poignant story. Charles left his job at Sam Wade's Excelsior Laundry, leaving behind his young wife Rose and their infant son John. He was killed on the opening day of the Somme, aged just twenty-three.

Proud dad Charles with his wife and son

His death shattered the family's fortunes overnight. Rose lost not only her husband but the family's principal wage earner. With a small child to support, she was forced to move in with relatives as the Army payments ceased. Three generations shared a modest terraced house, every member of the family working to make ends meet. Young John left school at fourteen to begin work at the Excelsior Laundry, while his grandfather continued working well beyond retirement in the local pits to help support the household.

Yet amid the hardship there was also remarkable resilience. The family endured because everyone contributed, and despite their own circumstances, Rose still found enough compassion to help poorer neighbours living on Tommy Row. It is a reminder that while war often reveals the worst of humanity, it can also bring out its very best.

Charles Greaves and William Booth represent two very different stories, but together they illustrate the true cost of the Somme. One family lost a national sporting hero; another lost an ordinary working man whose absence altered the course of generations. Both losses were felt just as deeply.

 

Multiply those stories by the countless men from our district who fell during the Battle of the Somme, and it becomes easier to understand why the battle cast such a long shadow over the District. Every name on the Roll of Honour was more than a soldier. He was someone's son, husband, brother, father, friend or workmate.


 

Memorial poppy placed today at Pudsey Cenotaph

More than a century later, the names cast onto our memorials continue to remind us that behind every casualty was a family whose lives were changed forever.

Lest We Forget.

Sources / Thanks: Mark Greaves and his sadly missed grandfather John, Martin Bradford / Ralph Middlebrook, Bradford Remembering 14-18 by Dr Kathryn Hughes

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