Name
Sidney Ernest Haines
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
09/04/1917
24
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Lance Corporal
602503
Canadian Infantry
7th Bn., British Columbia Regiment
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
ARRAS ROAD CEMETERY, ROCLINCOURT
Plot I, Row A, Grave 17.
France
UK & Other Memorials
Watford Borough Roll of Honour,
St Michael and All Angels Church Memorial, Watford
Pre War
Son of Frederick Henry and Julia Elizabeth Wenmoth (nee WENMOUTH) HAINES of Watford.
His parents married 5 December 1890 at St Paul’s, St Pancras, London. Frederick died 5 February 1944 in Bedmond, Herts, aged 74; Julia died 17 February 1956 in Watford aged 87, and was buried 24 February in Vicarage Road Cemetery, Watford.
Sydney was born 19 January 1893 in St Pancras, and worked as an insurance clerk in his father’s firm F H Haines & Sons. He sailed third class from Liverpool to Halifax, Nova Scotia, 3 January 1914 aboard the Allen Line Tunisian: a clerk aged 20 [listed as Sydney KEMPTON], with his friend Ralph KEMPTON (q.v.)
On the 1901 Census, aged 8 he lived in Oxhey, Herts, with his parents and four siblings. On the 1911 Census, an insurance clerk aged 18, he lived in Watford, with his parents and eight siblings.
Wartime Service
He attested into the Canadian Expeditionary Force 19 May 1915 at Guelph, Ontario: a farmer aged 22, 5’10½” tall, C of E. His next-of-kin was his mother of Watford.
He was hit in the head by an enemy machine gun bullet and killed instantaneously during an attack on Vimy Ridge, shortly after leaving the old front line.
Additional Information
There is an article about Sydney in the West Herts and Watford Observer dated 12 May 1917.
Acknowledgments
Sue Carter (Research) and Watford Museum (ROH on line via www.ourwatfordhistory.org.uk)
