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- 21st (4th Public School) Battalion, Royal Fusiliers during the Great War -


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21st (4th Public School) Battalion, Royal Fusiliers



   21st (4th Public Schools) Battalion, Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment) was raised in at Epsom on the 11th of September 1914 by the Public Schools and University Men's Force. Following initial training near home, on the 26th of June 1915 they joined 98th Brigade, 33rd Division. The Division concentrated at Clipstone camp near Mansfield in Nottinghamshire in July 1915. In August they moved to Salisbury Plain for final training and firing practice. They proceeded France in November and by the 21st, 33rd Division had concentrated near Morbecque, being strengthened by the exchange of 98th Brigade for the experienced 19th Brigade from 2nd Division. On the the 26 of February 1916 the battalion transferred to GHQ and was disbanded on the 24th of April 1916 with many of the men being commissioned.

2nd Dec 1915 Public School's Trench Instruction

11th Dec 1915 Reliefs

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Those known to have served with

21st (4th Public School) Battalion, Royal Fusiliers

during the Great War 1914-1918.

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  2nd Lt. Reginald Buckley 217th Company Machine Gun Corps

My grandfather, Reginald Buckley enlisted in the 21st Service Battalion, Royal Fusilers as a private on 13th July 1915, until being granted a commission in the Machine Gun Corps on 25th September 1916. On the 27th of May 1916 he joined No. 10 Officer Cadet Battalion at Gailes He was posted to the MGC on the 13th of October 1916. On the 1st of July 1917 he was wounded in action, but on the 8th of July 1917 he rejoined his Company. On the 17th of August 1917 he was again wounded in action, this time more seriously as he was taken to hospital and on the 27th of September 1917 arrived in England for further treatment. On the 3rd of November 1917 he was retired as permanently unfit for further military service.

Peter Buckley






  Capt. Edgar Vincent Peter Parsons 3rd Btn. Worcestershire Regiment (d.26th Apr 1918)

Edgar Vincent Peter Parsons was born at Worcester on June 14th 1893, son of John Parsons. He was Roman Catholic and member of St. George's Church, Worcester. He was educated at Stonyhurst College, Lancashire, entering in 1903 and leaving in 1910 to enter an engineering apprentice programme.

Edgar enlisted in September 1914 in 4th Public Schools Battalion, Royal Fusiliers and Commissioned 5th Battalion Worcestershire Regiment, later attached to the 2nd battalion. He was wounded in action with the 2nd Battalion on November 5th 1916 in trenches before Le Transloy on the Somme. After hospitalization he was attached to the 3rd Battalion, Worcesters, February 1917. During the Battle of Messines on June 7th he was MID for leading a carrying part of 80 ORs. He was promoted to Captain on June 22nd, 1917.

About 5a.m. on April 26th 1918 at the Second Battle of Kemmel he was wounded in the leg by a MG bullet, likely just northwest of Kemmel Village. Due to the circumstances of the battle it was not possible to rescue him from the battlefield and he was initially listed as wounded and missing, later changed to killed in action. Captain Parsons has no known grave.

Ralph Bennett






  W/O2 Joseph Henry Hughes MM 24th Batt (2nd Sportsmen's) Royal Fusiliers

Joe Hughes, my grandfather, was one of just six men of the original 24th, or 2nd Sportsmen's, battalion, raised at the Hotel Cecil in late 1914 and early 1915, remaining with the 2nd Sportsmen at the end of the war. He was a specialist in grenades, explosives and bombing raid training and leadership from 1916 to 1918, when he was promoted to CSM, I believe in B Coy., after the final German offensive in March 1918. He had refused the offer of a commission because it would have meant leaving the battalion, and he was determined to see the war through with his friends and comrades. Apart from being awarded the MM for his part in taking a heavily defended quarry at Rumilly, Cambrai, in 1918, his other distinction was that he was probably the first man to fire a Bangalore Torpedo (an explosive charge on a long rod, designed to blast gaps in barbed wire entanglements) in action. He was an enthusiastic member of the regimental association between the wars and in the post war years, and kept a fascinating collection of documents, photographs and artefacts, which are now with the Museum of the Royal Fusiliers at the Tower of London. He also left a fascinating collection of stories, some of which I recorded for the Museum, about life in the Battalion, through training in England - when the men went on strike over the quantity and quality of their food, and were threatened with cavalry and machine guns before returning to duty - and the three years on the Western Front that followed. Cross checking his accounts with the Battalion War Diary, I found a remarkable degree of accuracy - although the strike took place at Tidworth Camp in England, before the battalion was shipped to France, and did not therefore appear in the diary (I wonder whether this type of incident would have been recorded at all!)

Colin McDonald






  Lt. Graydon William Goldsworthy MC. 3rd Battalion West Yorkshire Regiment

Graydon Goldsworthy was my uncle and I am serching for his records. I have a copy of him joining in 14/11/1915, commisioned 4/9/1916, awarded M.C. 21/1/1919, retired 10/10/1921. I have recently received from his daughter, copies of his hand wrtten letters sent home to his parents from the trenches in France between Nov 1915 and Feb 1916.

Dr Peter Goldsworthy






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