Private. 1/6th Battalion, D Company, Duke of Wellington’s West Riding Regiment. Service number 3061.
Early life:
Fred Pickles was born in Keighley on 21st August 1891. His parents were John William Pickles and Elizabeth Pickles née Ackroyd, who had been married at Keighley Parish Church on 12th March 1887. John William was a joiner and they were living at 38, Quarry Street in the Parkwood area of Keighley. Fred was baptised at Keighley St Andrew’s Parish Church on 30th September 1891 and at that time they were probably still living at 12, Tyne Street with Elizabeth’s parents Nimrod and Mary Ackroyd.
By 1901 the family were living at 12, Wharfe Street in Parkwood and the family were John William and Elizabeth with their children Harry aged 14, Fred aged nine, Nellie aged seven, Ernest aged four and Mary aged two. Their father John William was a joinery foreman and the eldest child Harry was a worsted spinner.
Fred married Elizabeth Parle on 25th January 1910 at St. Mary’s Church, in the Eastwood area of Keighley. Nowadays the church has gone and is currently occupied by the Ford garage dealership.
On the date of their marriage Fred was aged 18 and was an iron worker living at 18, Carlisle Street and Elizabeth was aged 18 and living at 12, Wharfe Street. Their daughter Evelyn May Pickles was born on 31st May 1910 and her birth was registered in Keighley in the third quarter of the year, suggesting that their marriage may have been brought forward by news of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, since she was born just four months into their marriage.
Evelyn May Pickles was baptised on 22nd June 1910 at St. Andrew’s Parish Church, Keighley. At the time Fred was employed as a bolt maker and they were living at 13, Carlisle Street.
By 1911, apart from Harry, the whole family was still living with John William and Elizabeth at 13, Carlisle Street. John William aged 45 was a woodworker for a joinery machine works and with Elizabeth aged 44, had seven children, all of who were alive at this time. Fred was aged 19 and a bolt maker, Nellie was 16 and a spinner of worsted textile yarns, Ernest was 14 and a ‘screwer of bolts’ which suggests he was threading the plain bolt shanks. The youngest children were Mary aged eleven, Levi aged five and Nimrod aged three, all at school, probably Parkwood Primary School.
Also living with them were Fred’s wife Elizabeth, a worsted twister aged 19 and their daughter Evelyn May Pickles, still under one year of age.
War service:
Fred joined the Army early in the war. His name is listed in Keighley’s Gallant Sons (living at 11, Beta Street in Parkwood) as an early volunteer and he is listed in the nominal roll of the 1/6th Duke of Wellington’s (West Riding) Regiment which went out to France in April 1915, embarking from Folkestone on SS Onward and disembarking at Boulogne on 14th April. Shortly afterwards they moved to Neuf Berquin and stayed in billets on either side of the road before travelling on to Fleurbaix.
In August 1915 a photograph appeared in The Keighley News showing houses lining either side of the road and supposedly the first billets occupied by the men when they first reached France:
After staying here they were despatched to Fleurbaix and were staying at billets in the town when the buildings were shelled on 29th April. The men rushed outside to escape the shelling but one shell landed amongst the men killing two and wounding one other. Private Fred Pickles and Tom Critchison were killed and John Willie Midgley was badly wounded, but survived.
Fred was horribly mutilated by the force of the blast but Tom’s body was apparently intact. They were buried in the shell hole together because poor Fred was so mutilated. They had only been in France for two weeks.
WO-95/2801/1
1/6th Battalion, Duke of Wellington’s West Riding Regimental War diary transcription:
29th April, Rue de Quesne.
Fleurbaix was shelled by enemy, shells dropping close to billets.
11.30 am. D Company temporarily evacuated billets.
12.45 pm. Our billets were heavily shelled for about 1/2 an hour.
1 pm. No. 1958 Pte T. Critcheson & No. 3061 Pte F. Pickles were killed. No. 1658 Pte J. W. Midgley was wounded in several places by the same shell. all of D Coy. The deceased men were buried where shell fell owing to Pte Pickles being so mutilated. Place of burial H. 26. B. 8. 3. Sheet 36 B Series 3rd edition BELGIUM and FRANCE 1/40,000. No service. Chaplain not available.
WO-95/2765/1:
49th Division War diary transcription:
April 29th, 1915 Bac St. Maur (Thursday).
The enemy’s artillery were active during the morning opposite our sections of the defence. Heavy guns shelled FLEURBAIX and the billets occupied by 6th West Riding Battalion, two men being killed and one wounded.
In the same diary a signal dated p.m. 29/4/15 reported:
1. Progress report from no’s 3 and 4 sections. No 3 section situation unchanged report enemy shelling headquarters no 2 section 3.45 our artillery now ranging on enemy’s sap 3. no 4 section situation unchanged. about 11.30 am enemy shelled FLEURBAIX. RUE DU QUESNE about H.26.d.8.2…
2. …of Rue de Biache H.20.A.4.4 & again about 1.15 pm. 2 men Killed 1 man wounded 6th W.R.Regt on Rue du Quesne.
From Headquarters 2 W R Inf. Bde 4.50 pm.
Trench map showing the location of the billets at the time and the approximate spot where these two men were buried:
Keighley News May 8, 1915, page 5:
SERIES OF LOCAL CASUALTIES – TERRITORIALS KILLED BY SHELL FIRE
In private letters, reports are being received of the first casualties to Keighley Territorials who left Doncaster recently for the front. Up to Wednesday reports of the deaths of three men had been received, these being Private Critchison(sic), of Parkwood, Private Pickles, also believed to have belonged to Parkwood, and Private James Walsh, of Ada Street.
Writing to Mr Walter King, a member of the Eastwood Conservative Club, under Friday’s date, Private Fred Bell, of the transport section of the 6th West Riding Regiment, says:-
“Just a few lines to you and my pals to let you know that I am all right, but in the thick of the war. Poor Tom Critchison and Pickles were killed by a German shell. I was only fifty yards away with the horses when the shell killed them. It was terrible. They buried them where they fell. It made me think of old England. You will all be sorry at the club. Tom was my best pal here. We sleep in holes dug in the ground, like rabbits. Our Keighley lads are in the thick of it, but we shall be victorious in the end.”
In another letter received in the town a private in the Territorials says: –
“On Thursday we were shelled by the Germans, and we had two men killed and one wounded – all three Parkwood lads. We were very lucky in not having more killed as it was awful whilst it lasted.
We were in the reserve billets, about two and a half miles from the firing line. I went into the trenches the same night and came out again the next morning with a Keighley sergeant to get rations.”
HOW THE CASUALTIES AMONG KEIGHLEY MEN OCCURRED.
A Keighley Territorial tells in a letter home how the casualties occurred in his regiment. He writes: – “On Thursday we were just finishing dinner, when whizzing through the air came the first German shell. It dropped close to ‘D’ Company’s billet, and the men scattered in all directions; then more shells came along the line of billets. I was in my bungalow cottage with a mud floor, when I was told to clear out. I did so, and was making for some dugouts (a kind of underground shelter) when not more than 20 yards away burst about the twelfth of the series of shells. Clods of earth and pieces of the shell flew round in all directions and one piece dropped just at my feet, but I wasn’t touched. The shelling was continued from time to time, and after it was over we came slowly and mournfully back. Two of ours have gone to their last rest, and another was wounded, but is going on nicely. Oh, it’s a terrible thing is war.”
Post war and Remembrance:
Private Tom Critcheson’s grave was exhumed after the war and ‘concentrated’ into Rue-du-Bois Military Cemetery (about 2.5 km away), probably in 1920 – along with many other battlefield graves. The ‘concentrations’ of war burials were done to allow the civilian population to take back ownership of their farmlands and place all the war dead into specific cemeteries, rather than having small plots of war graves dotted all over the countryside which would be difficult to locate and also a problem to maintain.
There are 395 ‘unknown’ burials in the Rue-du-Boise Military cemetery and 13 on special memorial panels, indeed Tom Critchison has ‘unknown’ soldiers buried at either side of him. Is Fred Pickles buried in one of these graves? Sadly we may never know, as the concentration records for this cemetery do not exist and there is a possibility that when Tom was exhumed that they missed Fred’s remains or did not recognise that two men were buried in this spot, or that they did find something but could not identify him so they buried him as an unknown soldier.
We sent a request in 2016 for information on this matter to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, but they could only confirm that for Rue-du-Bois Military Cemetery, the concentration and burial return documents are missing, which is a great shame because they may have led to a positive identification of one of the unknown soldier graves.
Google Street view showing the spot about 50 metres in front of this position, where their burial site was (opens a new tab):
Private Tom Critcheson was reburied in grave 13 of row F in plot II, at Rue de Bois Military Cemetery near Fleurbaix. There is one unknown soldier of an unknown regiment buried in grave 14 of row F next to Tom. We can not prove this, but Fred may be that unknown soldier.
Because he has no known grave, Fred Pickles is named on Panel 6 of the Ploegsteert Memorial to the Missing, which is located 25 km to the North west, and is actually in Belgium rather than France, where Fred died.
Fred Pickles and Tom Critcheson are both remembered in Keighley’s Great War roll of honour book in Keighley Library.
Fred is also named on the WW1 memorial board in St. Andrew’s Church, Keighley.
Tom is also remembered on the Victoria Park Wesleyan Methodist Church war memorial, currently held in storage with Cliffe Castle Museum, Keighley.
Note:
1658 Private Joseph Wignall Midgley of 11, Tyne Street, Parkwood was the soldier who was wounded in the same shell explosion. He had a shrapnel wound to the head and a gunshot wound to the back and he was hospitalised at the time. He was discharged in 1917 and survived the war.
In Memoriam messages:
For at least the next three years on the anniversary of his death, his family left messages in the Keighley News:
THE KEIGHLEY NEWS. SATURDAY. APRIL 29 1916.
PICKLES-In loving memory of Fred Pickles, killed in action April 29th, 1915. We think of him in sleep,
And his name we oft recall,
Though there’s nothing left to answer, But his photo on the wall.
-From his Wife.
PICKLES-In loving memory of Private Fred Pickle the Territorials, who was killed in France, April 1915, aged 25 years.
On a far and distant battlefield,
With no cross to mark the place, Lies a loving son we treasured In a cold and unknown grave; We mourn for him in silence, And his name we oft recall, Though there’s nothing left to answer, But his photo on the wall.
From his loving Father and Mother.
THE KEIGHLEY NEWS. SATURDAY APRIL 28, 1917.
PICKLES-In loving memory Private Fred Pickles killed in France, April 29th, 1915
Memory ever clings.
Inserted by Father, Mother, and Grandmother.
PICKLES.-In loving memory of Pte. Fred Pickles killed in action April 29th, 1915
Dear husband, you are not forgotten, Nor ever will you be:
So long as life and memory lasts We will remember thee.
From his loving Wife and daughter May.
THE KEIGHLEY NEWS. SATURDAY, MAY 4, 1918.
PICKLES-In loving memory of Private Fred Pickles, killed in France April 29th, 1915
Our love for him keeps us from forgetting From his dear Father and Mothe
PICKLES-In loving memory of my dear husband Fred Pickles, who was killed in action April 20th, ever remembered by his Wife.
PICKLES-a loving memory of my dear father, Pte. Fred Pickles, who was killed April 29, 1915.
I cannot clasp your hand, Daddy, Thy face I cannot see.
But let this little token show, I still remember thee.
Love from May.
Family details:
Elizabeth received the sum of £1 0s 6d of money from Fred’s Army account on 20th January 1916. She later received a war gratuity sum of £3 on 12th July 1919. She would also have received Fred’s war service medals which were the 1914-15 Star, British War Medal and the Victory Medal along with the King’s certificate and a circular bronze War Memorial plaque inscribed with his name.
Fred’s widow Elizabeth was 28 when she was remarried, to Thomas Hastings on 27th July 1920 at St. Mary’s Church, Eastwood, which was on Dalton Lane in Keighley. Thomas had served with the Coldstream Guards in the war, between 1915 and 1919. He had served overseas, arriving at Boulogne in France on 1st November 1918, shortly before the Armistice but he did not return to the UK until 5th March 1919 and as a fit soldier still able to serve, he was transferred to the Z Reserve on 25th April and sent home.
Thomas, Elizabeth and Evelyn May were living at 6, Thames Street in Keighley during the 1921 census. Thomas was aged almost 26 and a tool fitter working for Dean, Smith and Grace. Elizabeth was aged almost 29 and employed as a worsted reeler by F. Dunderdales Ltd. Evelyn was aged eleven and a full time scholar, probably at Parkwood Primary School.
Elizabeth received a pension of 15 shillings per week beginning on 1st November 1915. This ran until Evelyn’s 16th birthday on 31st May 1926. Any war widow’s pension entitlement for Elizabeth would have ended when she married Thomas Hastings.
In the 1939 register, Thomas and Elizabeth Hastings were living at 102 Parkwood Street in Keighley.
Thomas died in 1973, registered at Bradford in the first quarter of the year. He would have been aged about 78.
Elizabeth died in 1975, registered at Bradford in the second quarter of the year. She would have been aged about 84.
Evelyn May Pickles married Jack Leslie Park in the first quarter of 1938.
They were living at 62, Grange Crescent in Keighley in the 1939 register, one other entry for that address is redacted, as that person is still alive. Jack was employed as a cashier for the Cooperative Society and a clerk for the Cooperative Wholesale Society. He also served as an air raid warden during the second world war.
Jack Park died on 17th November 1985. He would have been aged 76.
Evelyn Park died on 22nd August 2003. She would have been aged 93.
Information sources:
Birth, Death and Marriage records.
1901 and 1911 census records.
British Army service records.
British Army medal records.
Soldier’s effects records.
Soldiers Died in the Great War records.
Keighley Newspaper archives at Keighley Library.
Cliffe Castle Museum archives, Keighley.
Craven’s Part in the Great War.
The National Library of Scotland – Trench Mapping.
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission.
Local War Memorials.
The 1/6th Battalion Duke of Wellington’s West Riding Regiment War diary: WO95/2801/1.
The 49th Division War Diary: WO95/2765/1/1.
