Name
Joseph Woollams
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
30/09/1918
25
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Lance Corporal
16097
Bedfordshire Regiment
4th Bn.
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
1914 /15 Star, British War and Victory medals
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
VIS-EN-ARTOIS MEMORIAL
Panel 4 and 5.
France
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
Croxley Green Village Memorial, Croxley Green, All Saints' Church Shrine, Croxley Green, Rickmansworth Urban District Memorial, St. Peter's C & E Primary School Memorial, Mill End (*1)
Pre War
*1 The name that appears on the school memorial is only given as J Woollams, so it is not yet clear whether that is the man or James Woollams.
Joseph was born in Croxley Green on 7 March 1893 (christened in Croxley Green on 1 July 1893), so would have been 25 when he died. He was the eldest of the seven children (in 1911) of Joseph and Mary Rose Woollams of 231 New Road.
His brother William was killed in March 1917. Joseph and Mary Rose were married on 15 October 1893. In 1911 Joseph senior worked as a labourer at Croxley Mills and Joseph junior worked as a labourer on a farm.
The family and his sweetheart, Dolly, placed a moving memorial notice in the Watford Observer’s columns. His effects amounted to £39 18s 11d, paid to his mother in 1919.
Recorded as enlisting in Marylebone, London.
Wartime Service
Lance-Corporal Joseph Woollams, 4th Battalion Bedfordshire Regiment, died on 30 September 1918.
His qualifying date for the 1915 Star medal, when Joseph first arrived in France, was 30 August 1915. The 4th Bedfordshires were part of 190th Brigade and 63rd (Royal Naval) Division.
During 1918 the battalion was engaged in a series of major battles on the Western Front from the time of the German Spring Offensive in March. During September they fought in the second battle of Arras. He is remembered on the memorial to the missing at Vis-en-Artois, east of Arras.
Additional Information
Brother of Rifleman William Arthur Woollams who died of wounds on 13 Mar 1917 and who is also commemorated on this memorial. His effects amounted to £39 18s 11d, paid to his mother in 1919.
Acknowledgments
Malcolm Lennox, Brian Thomson, Croxley Green in the First World War Rickmansworth Historical Society 2014
