Name
Charles Neville Holmes
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
24/02/1917
29
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Private
624739
Canadian Infantry
Machine Gun Section, 50th Bn., Alberta Regiment
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
VILLERS STATION CEMETERY, VILLERS-AU-BOIS
Plot VII, Row C, Grave 7.
France
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
Watford Borough Roll of Honour, St Michael and All Angels Church Memorial, Watford, Watford Grammar School Memorial, Watford Grammar School Book of Remembrance
Pre War
Son of Harry George and Mary Jane/Jennie (nee SHARPE) HOLMES; husband of the late Martha Amelia (nee MACMILLAN) HOLMES.
His parents married 28 December 1886 at Holy Trinity. Hartshill, Staffs. Mary died 4 March 1945 aged 80; Harry died 3 June 1948 aged 84; both in Amersham, Bucks.
Charles was born 24 November 1887 [not 1890] in Willesden, London, and baptised 15 February 1888 at All Souls, Harlesden, London. He attended Callowland Board School, Watford, from 25 April 1898 to 27 February 1900, when he won a Fuller Scholarship to Watford Grammar School from 28 February 1900 to December 1903. He married 14 July 1910 at Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada.
On the 1891 Census, aged 3 he lived in Willesden, with his parents and two siblings. On the 1901 Census, aged 13 he lived in Watford, with his parents and two siblings. On the 1911 Canadian Census, a teamster aged 24, he lived in Montreal.
Wartime Service
He attested 5 February 1916: a labourer aged 25, 5’5″ tall, his next-of-kin his father of Accra, Gold Coast, West Africa. He either died of wounds at No. 12 Canadian Field Ambulance or was killed in action.
Additional Information
The published Watford Grammar School Book of Remembrance
entry reads:
“HOLMES, CHARLES NEVILLE. School period: February, 1900, to December, 1903. Machine Gun Section, 50th Canadians. Killed in France, 24th February, 1917.”
There is a Death announcement for Charles in the West Herts and Watford Observer dated 24 March 1917; plus In Memoriams in the issues dated 23 February 1918 and 1 March 1919.
Acknowledgments
Sue Carter (Research) and Watford Museum (ROH on line via www.ourwatfordhistory.org.uk)
