Name
William Gordon Blackwell
1885
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
05/10/1916
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Lieutenant
Royal Fusiliers *1
8th (City of London) Bn.
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
1914 (Mons) Star, British War and Victory Medals
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
THIEPVAL MEMORIAL
Pier and Face 8 C 9 A and 16 A.
France
Headstone Inscription
He has no headstone, he is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial to the fallen
UK & Other Memorials
Chipperfield Village Memorial, St Paul's Church Memorial, Chipperfield. Bengeo School Memorial – Location to be confirmed, St Matthew’s Church Memorial, Oxhey, Harrow Weald Memorial, Greater London, 2lt C Blackwell And Lt G Blackwell Harrow Weald Greater London London Stock Exchange Memorial Roll 1914-1918.
Pre War
William Gordon Blackwell was born in 1885, Harrow Weald, and baptised on 14th September 1885, in Harrow All Saints, Middx., to parents Samuel John and Elizabeth (nee Howard) Blackwell of the Crosse and Blackwell family. He was one of eleven.
The 1891 census shows him living at Brookshill House, Harrow Weald, with his father, who was living on his own means and five brothers and two sisters, his mother was not there at this time.
He attended Bengeo School, in Danesbury, Bengeo, Herts. In 1910 he married Nina Mary O’Malley and the 1911 census shows them living at The Kiln, Harrow Weald, where William is listed as a stock jobber for the stock exchange, which he had joined 1908. They had one son Middleton Joseph Marius Lindsay.
Wartime Service
He joined, on the same day as his older brother Charles, the Honourable Artillery Company on the outbreak of war as Acting Corporal 953. He went to France September 1914 with the 1st battalion H. A.C. Received a commission and was transferred to Royal Fusiliers 8th Bn. They fought at 1st Ypres, Ancre and Arras.
In 1916 they took part in the Somme campaign and William was killed in the assaults at Flers-Courcellete on 5 Oct 1916 and his body was not recovered, he was aged 31.
According to probate he left £3861 13s 11d to his brother Francis and another gentleman Wilfred Ward Cooper.
An obituary in the London Stock Exchange Roll of Honours states; "The seventh son of Samuel John Blackwell, JP, and Elizabeth and his wife and was born in 1885".
Educated at Mr Herbert Bowden-Smith's Preparatory School at Bengeo, privately. He joined his brother Robert in the firm of Blackwell Bros, and became a member of the stock exchange in 1908.
On declaration of war he enlisted straightaway in the Honourable Artillery Company and was sent to the French front in September 1914, obtaining a commission in the 4th Royal Fusiliers in 1915. He fell at Flers, in the Battle of the Somme, on 6 October 1916 being then attached to the 8th Royal Fusiliers.
One of his commanding officers said of him; “I saw a great deal of him and he naturally endeared himself to me by his kind nature and manliness of character. I deplore his loss, the nation has lost a gallant soldier and a great gentleman.
His major wrote; “He was a grand soldier, he could get the utmost out of men and did so, but they all worshipped him.
Lieutenant Blackwell married in 1910 Nina Mary, daughter of the late, Middleton Moore O'Malley and Mrs O'Malley of Westport, Co Mayo and leaves a widow and one son.
Biography
William Gordon Blackwell was born in Harrow Weald, Middlesex in 1885, the son of Samuel John Blackwell and his wife, Elizabeth Chrisp Blackwell (nee Howard), of the Crosse and Blackwell family.
Baptised on 14th September 1885 in the Parish of Harrow Weald in Middlesex.
Samuel Blackwell and his wife, Elizabeth Blackwell brought up their 11 children at Brookshill House, Harrow Weald.
1911 Census records William aged 25 and married under one year, (his wife’s name is not given just an initial “W”) they have a live-in Domestic Servant and her mother and brother are living with them. His Occupation is given as a Stock Jobber. Living at "The Kilns" Harrow Weald, Harrow on the Hill, Middlesex.
William and his elder brother Charles enlisted together in The Honourable Artillery Company with the Service No. 953 (Charles 954). He landed in France on 18th September 1914, with the HAC. He was sent for officer training and commissioned Lieutenant and posted to the Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment) on 27th January 1915. He was killed in action at the Battle of the Somme on 5th October 1916, he has no known grave and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing. Pier & Face 8C, 9A & 16A. (Battle of the Somme 1st July 1916 to 18th November 1916).
In 1910, at the age of 69, his father Samuel inherited the Manor House at Chipperfield and became a great benefactor to the village. In 1915 Samuel and Elizabeth celebrated their Golden Wedding, but it was not a happy year for them as news came that their son, Charles, serving as Second Lieutenant in the 4th Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers, had been killed in action on 20 July 1915, aged 32.
The following year, a second son, William Gordon, known as ‘Don’, serving as a Lieutenant in the 8th Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment) was also killed in France. After the war in 1922, Samuel and Elizabeth had the Chipperfield Social Club built in their memory. Samuel never got over his loss. His health deteriorated and he died in January 1923. Today ‘Blackwell’s’, which stands next to the Common, is a social club and café.
William Gordon and his brother, Charles Blackwell, are commemorated on the St Matthew’s Church Memorial, Oxhey, near ‘Oxhey Place’, a family home of the Blackwell’s.
Additional Information
His brother Charles, Second Lieutenant of the 4th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers, was killed the previous year on 20/7/1915. The Soldiers Effects Register show his date of death as 8 October 1916 and a war gratuity of £78.7s.11d was paid to his executors. A Clubhouse was built in Chipperfield in 1922 by Mr and Mrs Blackwell in memory of their two sons.
*1 More correctly (City of London) Bn. London
Regiment (Post Office Rifles).
Acknowledgments
Stuart Osborne, Neil Cooper
Dianne Payne - www.busheyworldwarone.org.uk, Jonty Wild, Ann Hacke, Terry & Glenis Collins, Paul Johnson
