Name
Edward George Rattee
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
23/10/1915
37
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Rifleman
3178
Monmouthshire Regiment
1st Bn.
"C" Coy,
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Not Yet Researched
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
LE TREPORT MILITARY CEMETERY
Plot 2. Row J. Grave 5A.
France
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
Sawbridgeworth Town Memorial, Great St Mary’s Church Memorial, Sawbridgeworth, 1st Battalion Monmouthshire Regiment Memorial, St. Woolos Cathedral, Newport, Gwent.
Pre War
Edward was the son of the late Thos. G. and Ellen Rattee, of March, Cambs. He was born born in 1878 at North Witchford, near March in Cambridgeshire and lived there at Creek Road.
Edward was a professional serviceman and in the 1901 census, he is recorded as being an ‘Ordinary Seaman’ with the Royal Navy, on leave and visiting his brother in Stowmarket. He seems to have been based at Pembroke Naval Dock in South Wales. At some point after 1911, Edward left the Navy, but remained in South Wales.
By 1914, his family had moved to the Sawbridgeworth area and was a resident there when he in enlisted in Newport, Monmouthshire.
Wartime Service
When war broke out Edward would have been in the Reserve and mobilised. It is surprising that he appears in the Army rather than the Navy.
Edward served with the 1st Battalion Monmouthshire Regiment, arriving in France in February 1915. This unit took heavy casualties at the Second Battle of Ypres in April-May 1915, and in September that year, was re-organised as a Pioneer Battalion.
On 13 October 1915, the Battalion again took heavy casualties assaulting the Hohenzollern Redoubt during the Battle of Loos. It was here that Edward was mortally wounded. He died of his wounds on 23 October 1915. He was aged 37.
Edward Rattee is buried at Le Treport Military Cemetery, France and is also named on the 1st Battalion Monmouthshire Regiment Memorial at St. Woolos Cathedral, Newport, Gwent.
Acknowledgments
Jonty Wild, Douglas Coe
