Name
Walter Bennett
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
26/10/1917
18
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Private
41685
South Staffordshire Regiment
1st Bn.
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
British War and Victory medals
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
ZANTVOORDE BRITISH CEMETERY
VI. B. 20.
Belgium
Headstone Inscription
No Report
UK & Other Memorials
Abbots Langley Village Memorial, St. Lawrence Church Memorial, Abbots Langley, Not on the Bedmond memorials
Biography
Walter Bennett was born in 1898 at Bedmond, Abbots Langley, youngest of three sons born to William Bennett and Alice (nee Edmonds) of 48 High Street, Bedmond. William was recorded working as an Agricultural Labourer in the 1901 Census. On the 1911 Census William is recorded at the same address as a shepherd while Walter is still at school. There was now a daughter, Florence Maud, born in 1905. Walter’s Mother died in 1916.
Walter was first recorded serving with the 2nd Training Reserve Battalion in the March 1917 edition of the Abbots Langley Parish Magazine Roll of Honour. It is not known exactly when he enlisted, but he did so at Bedford, giving his residence at Abbots Langley at that point. He may have transferred from the Training Reserve to the Bedfordshire’s, but it is unknown when he transferred from the Training Reserve to the Staffordshire’s, and the Roll of Honour continued to associate Walter with the Bedfordshire Regiment, whilst he was recorded “Missing”. It was only a year later, when his death was confirmed. In the December 1917 edition of the Abbots Langley Parish Magazine he was reported wounded and missing, and almost a year later in the October 1918 edition his death was confirmed and it was realised that he had been serving with the 1st South Staffordshire Regiment: “Walter Bennett of the South Staffs Regt, has been missing since August 1917 (sic), and is now presumed to have been killed in action. He had only been in France a few weeks. His brother, as Rupert, was killed in action on October 26th (sic) 1916. We offer their father our sincere sympathy.”
Walter Bennett was killed in action serving with the 1st Battalion of the South Staffordshire Regiment, on the opening day of the Second Battle of Passchendaele on 26th October 1917. “Killed in Action” was confirmed by three sources as occurring on 26th October 1917. Walter was buried at the Zantvoorde British Cemetery, five miles south of Ypres in Belgium, and was commemorated on the Abbots Langley War Memorial.
Older brother Rupert was killed in action with the Middlesex Regiment on the Somme on 23 October 1916.
Acknowledgments
Neil Cooper
Roger Yapp - www.backtothefront.org
