MY HEROIC UNCLE ALFRED ‘the great’ VC
Every British family carries a scar of the First World War, even though most will be tucked away across two generations. Mine, however, is a little more immediate and the anniversary of the outbreak of that awful conflict has scratched at its surface once again.
I have been trying for at least a decade now to find where my father, Sergeant Leonard Wilcox of the 2nd battalion South Staffordshire Regiment, was wounded as he went over the top during the Battle of the Somme in 1916. Letters to the Ministry of Defence, a study of the regimental history and, much earlier, questions to my mother, elicited nothing.
Now, just when I was reconciled to journeying to Wolverhampton, where a study in the library of the Wolverhampton Express and Star of the micro-film daily lists of the wounded from that great battle might provide at least a clue, a reader of my novels has provided the answer.
Leonard Wilcox, the youngest brother (left) Bernard Wilcox MM, who lost an eye on the Wrstern Front (middle) 'Cheeky chappy' Arnest Wilcox, who won the DSO
From out of the blue, Terry Carter from Castle Bromwich, Birmingham, has written to send me copies of my father’s medical records, which show that 21-year-old Sgt Wilcox was severely wounded by enemy shrapnel on the morning of 13 November 1916, as he led his platoon against the German Heidenkopf Redoubt at Beaumont-Hamel, France. What’s more, he tells me that my well-remembered dad (he eventually died in 1945 from tuberculosis, resulting from those wounds) had volunteered in 1914 and had spent a harrowing 80 days in hospital after the battle back in Blighty before being put on home duties to see out the rest of the war.
I still don’t know where Mr Carter found these records but I haven’t stopped to question him. I am off , early next month, to that little village on the Somme, where I am told a guide will show me the spot where my father crawled through the wire to meet his destiny 98 years ago.
This will, I trust, bring a kind of closure to the questions that have surrounded memories of my father and his brothers all through my life.
Leonard Wilcox was one of 14 working-class children who grew up in the last quarter of the 19th century in the back streets of Birmingham, as did I, many years later – leaving me with the conviction that Birmingham was a city that didn’t have any front streets at all. (Vanity here insists that I reveal that, although I am now clearly old, I am not that old, in that my dad was the youngest of seven brothers and he was 40 when I was born.)
Beamont-Hamel in France was devestated during the war; The memorial to Alfred
All of those seven brothers fought in the Great War, all as rifle and bayonet frontline troops, and, amazingly, they all survived to return to their homes in Aston, within cheering distance of the great red-brick edifice of Villa Park, home to Aston Villa, then arguably the most famous football club in the world.
Ironically, if they had been born higher up the social ladder and been commissioned, then surely the German snipers would have picked them off as they crossed no man’s land.
As it was, Uncle Bernard, also a sergeant, came back with only one eye and the Military Medal; Uncle Ernest, an acting regimental sergeant major at the ridiculously young age of 23, won the Distinguished Service Order, the highest award for bravery after the Victoria Cross; and Uncle Alfred, the oldest of the younger quartet, although only a lance corporal, returned with the coveted VC, awarded after single-handedly bombing his way up a German trench, destroying four machine guns and killing their crews.
I remember them, but not the older three brothers who all died before I was born. Uncle Alfred – ‘Alfred the Great’ – loomed large over my childhood, as the patriarch of the family. Yet looming wasn’t something that Alf did, for I recall him as a redcheeked, wavy-haired, jovial man in his middle and later years, who never, of course, spoke of the war. He died in 1954 and, as a cub reporter, I covered his interment for the Birmingham Post.
Years later, I returned from London to visit my father’s grave in Aston Parish churchyard. Alfred, I remembered, had been buried appropriately about 100 yards south of his brother. Yet I could find no sign of it – no headstone, no mound. Puzzled, I resolved to follow this up, but never did so.
Fast forward now to 2006. By this time I had acquired some modest fame as a novelist and I heard from a researcher in Birmingham who was trying to locate the graves of all that city’s VCs. He too could find no trace of Alfred Wilcox. Could I help? Together we visited the site again, abortively. My uncle had had two sons who surely had the resources to mount a headstone. But they and their wives had died without issue. Two pages in the parish records for the years 1953 and 1954 were missing. Neither the resident vicar nor the Bishop of Birmingham could help. A mystery... Nevertheless, I decided that the hero of my childhood should not lie unrecorded. So, with the willing help of the Regimental Association of the Ox and Bucks Light Infantry, Alfred’s old regiment, and what was left of the Wilcox family – now spread around the UK – we raised the money to erect a handsome stone, near, at least, to the place of his burial. With the family remnants and a distinguished group from the regiment, including two full generals, the stone was unveiled and we had a splendid party afterwards at Villa Park.
That took place exactly 88 years to the day after the action that earned Alfred his cross. Now, eight years on, I hope that my Beaumont-Hamel journey will put in place the last chapter in the story of my brave father and his brothers.
Starshine, John Wilcox’s moving novel of the First World War, is published in paperback by Allison & Busby, priced £7.99.
I have been trying for at least a decade now to find where my father, Sergeant Leonard Wilcox of the 2nd battalion South Staffordshire Regiment, was wounded as he went over the top during the Battle of the Somme in 1916. Letters to the Ministry of Defence, a study of the regimental history and, much earlier, questions to my mother, elicited nothing.
Now, just when I was reconciled to journeying to Wolverhampton, where a study in the library of the Wolverhampton Express and Star of the micro-film daily lists of the wounded from that great battle might provide at least a clue, a reader of my novels has provided the answer.
Leonard Wilcox, the youngest brother (left) Bernard Wilcox MM, who lost an eye on the Wrstern Front (middle) 'Cheeky chappy' Arnest Wilcox, who won the DSO From out of the blue, Terry Carter from Castle Bromwich, Birmingham, has written to send me copies of my father’s medical records, which show that 21-year-old Sgt Wilcox was severely wounded by enemy shrapnel on the morning of 13 November 1916, as he led his platoon against the German Heidenkopf Redoubt at Beaumont-Hamel, France. What’s more, he tells me that my well-remembered dad (he eventually died in 1945 from tuberculosis, resulting from those wounds) had volunteered in 1914 and had spent a harrowing 80 days in hospital after the battle back in Blighty before being put on home duties to see out the rest of the war.
I still don’t know where Mr Carter found these records but I haven’t stopped to question him. I am off , early next month, to that little village on the Somme, where I am told a guide will show me the spot where my father crawled through the wire to meet his destiny 98 years ago.
This will, I trust, bring a kind of closure to the questions that have surrounded memories of my father and his brothers all through my life.
Leonard Wilcox was one of 14 working-class children who grew up in the last quarter of the 19th century in the back streets of Birmingham, as did I, many years later – leaving me with the conviction that Birmingham was a city that didn’t have any front streets at all. (Vanity here insists that I reveal that, although I am now clearly old, I am not that old, in that my dad was the youngest of seven brothers and he was 40 when I was born.)
Beamont-Hamel in France was devestated during the war; The memorial to AlfredAll of those seven brothers fought in the Great War, all as rifle and bayonet frontline troops, and, amazingly, they all survived to return to their homes in Aston, within cheering distance of the great red-brick edifice of Villa Park, home to Aston Villa, then arguably the most famous football club in the world.
Ironically, if they had been born higher up the social ladder and been commissioned, then surely the German snipers would have picked them off as they crossed no man’s land.
As it was, Uncle Bernard, also a sergeant, came back with only one eye and the Military Medal; Uncle Ernest, an acting regimental sergeant major at the ridiculously young age of 23, won the Distinguished Service Order, the highest award for bravery after the Victoria Cross; and Uncle Alfred, the oldest of the younger quartet, although only a lance corporal, returned with the coveted VC, awarded after single-handedly bombing his way up a German trench, destroying four machine guns and killing their crews.
I remember them, but not the older three brothers who all died before I was born. Uncle Alfred – ‘Alfred the Great’ – loomed large over my childhood, as the patriarch of the family. Yet looming wasn’t something that Alf did, for I recall him as a redcheeked, wavy-haired, jovial man in his middle and later years, who never, of course, spoke of the war. He died in 1954 and, as a cub reporter, I covered his interment for the Birmingham Post.
Years later, I returned from London to visit my father’s grave in Aston Parish churchyard. Alfred, I remembered, had been buried appropriately about 100 yards south of his brother. Yet I could find no sign of it – no headstone, no mound. Puzzled, I resolved to follow this up, but never did so.
Fast forward now to 2006. By this time I had acquired some modest fame as a novelist and I heard from a researcher in Birmingham who was trying to locate the graves of all that city’s VCs. He too could find no trace of Alfred Wilcox. Could I help? Together we visited the site again, abortively. My uncle had had two sons who surely had the resources to mount a headstone. But they and their wives had died without issue. Two pages in the parish records for the years 1953 and 1954 were missing. Neither the resident vicar nor the Bishop of Birmingham could help. A mystery... Nevertheless, I decided that the hero of my childhood should not lie unrecorded. So, with the willing help of the Regimental Association of the Ox and Bucks Light Infantry, Alfred’s old regiment, and what was left of the Wilcox family – now spread around the UK – we raised the money to erect a handsome stone, near, at least, to the place of his burial. With the family remnants and a distinguished group from the regiment, including two full generals, the stone was unveiled and we had a splendid party afterwards at Villa Park.
That took place exactly 88 years to the day after the action that earned Alfred his cross. Now, eight years on, I hope that my Beaumont-Hamel journey will put in place the last chapter in the story of my brave father and his brothers.
Starshine, John Wilcox’s moving novel of the First World War, is published in paperback by Allison & Busby, priced £7.99.