Name
Bertram Saunders
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
15/01/1917
31
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Private
3658
Hertfordshire Regiment
1st Bn.
4 Coy.
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Not Yet Researched
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
BOULOGNE EASTERN CEMETERY
VIII. C. 177.
France
Headstone Inscription
With honour and love
UK & Other Memorials
Hitchin Town Memorial, 4 Co' Hertfordshire Reg' Territorials’ Memorial, Hitchin, St Mary's Church Roll of Honour (Book), Hitchin, Hertfordshire Regimental Memorial, All Saints Church, Hertford
Pre War
His wife was Lilian A. Saunders and they had two children aged 9 and 6 years and lived at 30, Old Park Road, Hitchin.
Before joining up he was employed by Ewart & Son and prior to that had worked for Quenby & Co. the grocers of Bucklersbury in Hitchin. He was a resident of Hitchin, but enlisted in Hertford in November 1914.
Wartime Service
Bertram was given the Regimental Number 3658. He was sent to France in August 1916 and served in No. 4 Company of the 1st Battalion. He died from wounds received during routine trench warfare in the Ypres Salient in Belgium.
He wrote home on the 10th January 1917 that all was well, but on the 15th January he was wounded in the back in two places and he had to be operated on to remove pieces of shrapnel. Twelve hours later, at 1.20am, he died in No. 2 Canadian Stationary Hospital near Boulogne. A Corporal at the hospital wrote to his widow offering to send the pieces of shrapnel that had killed her husband. The response is not known.
He was buried in Plot 8, Row C, Grave 177 in Boulogne Eastern Cemetery in France. The gravestones in this cemetery are laid flat, this usually indicates poor ground conditions.
Additional Information
A private inscription on the stone reads: "With honour and love".
Acknowledgments
Adrian Dunne, David C Baines, Jonty Wild
