Name
John Shaw-Jones
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
37
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Private
Royal Army Pay Corps
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
SANDRIDGE (ST. LEONARD) CHURCHYARD
United Kingdom
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
St Albans Citizens Memorial, Town Hall (old) Memorial, St Albans, Fleetville Memorial (Hatfield Rd Cemetery), Town Hall Memorial, St Albans
Pre War
John Shaw Jones was born in St David’s, Brecknockshire, Wales in 1881 to John William Jones and his wife Eliza (possibly Williams) who was from Hereford. John William was a Railway Clerk. The family had moved to St Albans in Hertfordshire by 1891, and John William was then a ‘Sub Inspector of Railways’. John Shaw, then aged nine, was the eldest of their four children.
In 1898, at the age of eighteen, John Shaw enlisted with the 18th Hussars. His military records show that he was five feet, five and three-quarter inches tall and weighed 122 pounds. He spent three years in South Africa. His next of kin was his father, whose address then was St Albans. He married Regina Rayner in 1904 in St Albans and they had two children, Gladys in 1905 and Doris in 1906. In the 1911 census John gave his occupation as ‘Accountants Clerk’.
Wartime Service
Additional Information
In September 1914 he joined the Regular Army at the Cavalry Depot in Woolwich and this time Regina Shaw Jones was his next-of-kin. He was a Private in the Army Pay Corps. In June 1916 he was declared unfit for military duty for War or Home Service. By 1918 he had a position as ‘Auditor of Ministry of Munitions’ and the family had moved from St Albans to Southend-on-Sea in Essex.
It can be presumed that John Shaw Jones had been on Ministry business in Ireland and was returning home on RMS Leinster on the 10th of October 1918. He did not survive the sinking, but his body was recovered. An inquest was held in Kingstown on the 15th in order that a death certificate could be issued for burial in England. Dr Molloy of St Michael’s Hospital, Kingstown deposed that death was due to drowning. He was buried in the churchyard of St Leonard’s Church, Sandridge, Hertfordshire. His name is recorded on the St Alban’s Roll of Honour.
Acknowledgments
Jonty Wild, www.rmsleinster.com, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Leinster
