680645 GNR-S/S C. H. BRADSHAW.  R.F.A.

 

Cuthbert Harry Bradshaw was born in March 1889 in Preston.  His father was Robert William Bradshaw (b. 1860 in Singleton, Lancashire), an outdoor labourer and contractor.  His mother was Alice Ann Whiteside (b. 1862 in Preston).  The couple were married in 1886 and they had four children; Cuthbert was the first, followed by Walter (b. 1893), Alice Ann (b. 1897), and Gertrude (1902-1903).  In 1911, the family lived at 174 Eldon Street, Preston.  Cuthbert was a police constable.  William died in 1911, a couple of months after the Census.  In 1912, Cuthbert married Rosa Lily Jeanette (Netta) Brooker (b. 1886 in Beverley, East Yorkshire).  Netta was from a military family; her father John Brooker (b. 1845 in Rudgwick, Sussex) was a Colour Sergeant in the East Lancashire Regiment and had served in India.  The Brookers moved to Preston in the 1890s.  John Brooker died in 1911, just before the Census.  Netta was a laundry worker (ironer).  Cuthbert and Netta had a daughter, Amy, who was born in the spring of 1915, about the same time as Cuthbert joined the Army.  The family then lived at 73 Harcourt Street, Preston.

 

So Cuthbert joined the Royal Field Artillery in May 1915 and was assigned service number 680645.  He was posted to “B” Battery of 286 Brigade and became a shoeing smith.  He landed in France with 57th Division in February 1917 and served with 286 Brigade throughout the campaigns in France and Belgium.  He had still not been demobilised and was still in France when he died (almost certainly of influenza) on 25 March 1919.  He was 30 years old.

 

Rank:  Gunner

Service No:  680645

Date of Death:  25/03/1919

Age:  30

Regiment/Service:  Royal Field Artillery, "B" Bty. 286th Bde.

Grave Reference: VII. C. 22.

Cemetery:  DUISANS BRITISH CEMETERY, ETRUN

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