Name
Arthur Obadiah Smith
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
24/02/1917
17
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Private
33813
Machine Gun Corps (Infantry)
187th Company
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Not Yet Researched
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
BASRA MEMORIAL
Panel 41
Iraq
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
Bushey Town Memorial, St James’ Church Memorial, Bushey
Pre War
Born in Bushey in 1898 and baptised in Bushey on 17 April 1898, Arthur Obadiah was the son of Francis Arthur and Helen (nee Newnham) Smith. His parents were married in 1891 in the registration district of Kidderminster.
At the 1901 census, Arthur was three years old and living at Heydon Hill Lodge in Bushey with his parents and three siblings, named William, Lizzie and Gertrude. Francis (recorded as Frank) was working as a domestic gardener, and he and Helen (recorded as Ellen) were 36 and 35 years old, whilst William, Lizzie, Arthur and Gertrude were nine, five, three and 3 months old respectively. The birthplaces were given as Grimley in Worcestershire for Francis, Arley (near Kidderminster) in Staffordshire for Helen, Worcester for William and Bushey for the other three children.
At the 1911 census, Francis was still working as a domestic gardener and the family was living at 67 Upper Paddock Road in Oxhey. Arthur was 14 years old and, whilst Lizzie (now recorded as Elizabeth May) had left home, he now had a third sister named Helen Jane. William (now recorded as Thomas William) was working as a news boy and the other three children were at school. The birthplace for Helen Jane was also given as Bushey.
Wartime Service
Arthur enlisted in Willesden, initially as Private 1422 with the Middlesex Regiment before subsequently being transferred as Private 33813 with the Machine Gun Corps. He served in the Asiatic theatre of war and was killed in action, aged 17, on 24 February 1917 in Mesopotamia. He is remembered with honour at the Basra Memorial in Iraq and is also commemorated at the Bushey Memorial and at St James’ Parish Church, Bushey.
Arthur’s pension card named his mother, Helen, as his dependant, living at 67 Upper Paddock Road in Bushey. It showed a pension award of 3s. and 6d. per week with effect from 25 September 1917. His parents subsequently moved to 85 Glencoe Road in about 1921 and the 1939 England and Wales Register shows them living at that address.
Helen died in 1946 and her name was crossed through on the pension card, annotated as deceased and replaced by Francis with the address of 85 Glencoe Road in Bushey.
Additional Information
Dianne Payne - www.busheyworldwarone.org.uk, Jonty Wild
Acknowledgments
Andrew Palmer
Dianne Payne - www.busheyworldwarone.org.uk, Jonty Wild
