Name
Jesse Brown
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
17/05/1919
42
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Acting Bombardier
25322
Royal Garrison Artillery
11th Company
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Not Yet Researched
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
BUSHEY (ST. JAMES) CHURCHYARD
Spec. Memorial.
United Kingdom
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
Not on the Bushey memorials
Pre War
Jesse Brown of Crook Log, a row of terraced cottages on the London Road, Bushey, was the younger son of William Brown and his wife Fanny. William died when Jesse was very young and Fanny re-married and had four more children. For a time, all her children used the surname Bates.
Fanny was widowed a second time and moved from a cottage near Bentley Priory to Crook Log in Bushey.
Wartime Service
Jesse enlisted with the Royal Garrison Artillery and became Acting Bombardier 25322 with the 6th Battalion. After the war on 17 May 1919 he was found hanged. The verdict at the inquest stated that he had taken his own life during a fit of insanity aggravated by shell-shock. He was 42.
He was buried in Bushey churchyard with a gravestone provided by the Commonwealth Graves Commission.
His pension record shows the claimant as Fanny Elizabeth Bates, of 9 Crook Log, Bushey with an award of 5/- per week for life. It is subsequently annotated cancelled 17/02/34. The service number for the pension record has been incorrectly transcribed as 5322, whereas the original is 25322.
Additional Information
Information provided with the kind permission of Bushey First World War Commemoration Project – Please visit www.busheyworldwarone.org.uk.
Acknowledgments
Andrew Palmer
Dianne Payne - www.busheyworldwarone.org.uk, Jonty Wild
