Name
Edward (Ted) Goldsmith
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Hertfordshire Regiment
1st Bn.
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
Pirton School Memorial
Biography
Edward appears on the School War Memorial, confirming that he attended the school. Parish records suggest only one man of this name who could have served, and he was born on September 28th, 1896 to William and Emma Goldsmith (née Walker). Baptism and census records list twelve children, but by 1911 two had died. At this time, only ten can be identified with certainty; they are Frederick Goldsmith Walker (b July 1879 – William and Emma married in October 1879), George (b 1881, d 1883 aged two), Mary Jane (b 1883, Jane Mary in the 1901 census), William Charles (b 1885, d 1912), John (b 1887), Bertie (b 1890), Susan (b 1892), Sidney (b 1894), Edward (b 1896), Alice Mabel (b 1898) and Emily Elizabeth (b 1901). One of the unknown children could be Harry (b1904, died at two months), which would leave one unnamed. Sidney, Ted’s brother, served and survived and it is also possible that the John Goldsmith who also served and survived was Sidney’s brother, but there appear to be two possibilities, with Ted’s brother being one.
In the 1911 census, Edward, although only fourteen, was listed as a surgeon’s assistant. However, the assistant was subsequently crossed out and the correction is unclear.
Ted is recorded in the Parish Magazine of October 1914 as enlisting during 1914, but after July, and serving in the 1st Hertfordshire Regiment. He would have been about eighteen years old.
The Hertfordshire Express of April 13th 1914 reports his parents as living around Little Green - in fact they had done so since at least 1901. It also confirms that he also had an older brother serving (believed to be Sidney). Both his brother and Ted had been wounded, Ted in the leg.
A letter from Norman Newbery, dated December 1914, thanks Mr Franklin for the gift of jerseys for him, W Reynolds (could be Walter or William) and Edward Goldsmith. It also confirms that all three were in “G” Company and at Thurston in Suffolk, near Bury St. Edmunds.
He went to France in January 1915 and in May 1915 he was reported as killed. His family must have been distraught, but the North Herts Mail of May 20th 1915 confirms, from information provided by a cousin Private Vine from Henlow, that the earlier report was a mistake.
A local paper from 1916 reported that on September 11th, at the request of Corporal Harry Smith, Ted performed the sad duty of writing to inform the mother of John Parsell that he had died the day before. All three were Pirton men. It seems likely that Edward was also injured in this explosion as the North Herts Mail reports, shortly afterwards, that one of the Goldmiths had been slightly wounded (for the second time), near his ear by a bit of shell. In the letter, she is told that, just before his death, John (Parsell) of the Hertfords had been ‘very cheerful having seen Fred Baines and Arthur Odell of the Royal Sussex and George Thompson of the ASC’ - again all Pirton men. Sadly the same shell resulted in the injury of George Roberts and the death of Arthur.
Patti Salter, whose family tree includes many Pirton people, believes that it is possible that Ted was John’s cousin. Corporal Harry Smith, who died later in the war, was his fourth cousin and Arthur Walker was Ted’s second cousin. Perhaps this sad incident amply demonstrates the interrelationship of the families of Pirton and the widespread impact a death could have.
The North Herts Mail of November 9th 1916 adds to the information: the family lived in Franklin’s Lane, (now Walnut Tree Road), and Ted had been employed in Dr Grellett’s surgery in Hitchin - Dr Grellett was a popular doctor in Pirton. By that date, he also held the rank of Lance Corporal. He had been wounded again (third time), but was ‘making good progress’ in Boulogne Hospital, where he had been admitted on October 15th. His injury, if taken at face value, seems relatively minor - ‘A piece of barbed wire being in his foot’, but perhaps it had been lodged there by explosion because he was moved from Boulogne Hospital to the G N Hospital in Leeds and then The Red Cross Hospital at Malton, Yorkshire, where he was operated on. At the time that he was wounded, the 1st Hertfordshire Battalion was fighting on the Somme, in a battle for the Schwaben Redoubt*1, which was finally taken on October 14th. The North Herts Mail of April 11th 1918 confirms that he had healed and he certainly carried on fighting because he was wounded again, for the fourth time, during the massive German offensive during the spring of that year – the Germans were desperate to break the Allies before the Americans could join them in full force.
*1 A redoubt is a fortified stronghold.
Acknowledgments
Text from the book ‘The Pride of Pirton’ by Jonty Wild, Tony French & Chris Ryan used with author's permission.
