Name
Walter Dowler
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
18/11/1914
29
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Driver
25085
Royal Field Artillery
46th Battery, 39th Brigade
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
1914 (Mons) Star, British War and Victory Medals
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
YPRES (MENIN GATE) MEMORIAL
Panel 5 and 9.
Belgium
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
St Mary’s Church Memorial, Rushden
Pre War
Born in 1885 in Rushden, Herts. son of Thomas (born in Rushden) and Susan (nee Webster) Dowler (born in Norwich) and christened on 10 May 1885 in Rushden.
1891 census details. Living in Baldock with his parentsHe was the son of Thomas and Susan Dowler. Thomas (born in Rushden) was 40 and working as an agricultural labourer, his wife was 42 and had been born in Norwich. They had Mary 8 and Walter 6 and they were living in Norton St. Baldock.
1901 census details. Walter 17, was now in lodgings in Norton Rd. at the Black Eagle Public House with 9 other lodger. He was working on the land as a haybinder. The publicans were William and Lucy Turner.
1911 census details. Walter cannot be found on the 1911 census but we know that he would have been 26 or 27.
He married Nellie Margaret (nee Eames) Dowler, of Fir Tree Cottage, Headley, Bordon, Hants. on 3 Sep 1913.
Wartime Service
He enlisted in Hitchin and because he was across in France on August 16th 1914 he was awarded the 1914 Star (Mons Star), as well as the War and Victory medals. This indicates that he could have been a regular soldier as he was across in France so soon after war broke out (August 16th. 1914) . His next of kin is his wife Nellie Margaret who was said to be living at Fir Tree Cottage, Headley, Borden, Hants. Which was and still is a military area.
No service records have survived. He was 25085 Driver Dowler in the 46th. Battery, 39th. Brigade, Royal Field Artillery. He most probably worked with the horses pulling the gun carriages and they were providing artillery coverage for the 1st, Infantry Division.
Records show that his Division went across to France between August 11th. and 15th. He would have been involved in the retreat from Mons, the Battles of the Marne and the ‘Race to the Sea’ before the 1st. Passchendaele.
In the days prior to the 13th. November which was the last day of the battle, the 1st. Division was holding the line during the big enemy attacks as the Germans tried to get past Gheluvelt along the Menin Road to Ypres. Although the 1st. Division was pulled back after November 13th. their artillery would still have been left assisting others ‘holding the line’ and would have been under fire from the enemy.
Driver Walter Dowler aged 29 was killed on the November 18th. just 3 months after arriving in Europe and his body was never found. His name appears on the great Menin Gate (Panels 5/9) in Ypres alongside 54,000 others who were not found but still lie there on the battlefields.
Additional Information
Brother of Thomas Henry Dowler died 27 Jul 1916 and listed on this same memorial.
Acknowledgments
Malcolm Lennox, Jean Handley
