Name
Sydney John Chandler
1892
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
19/08/1915
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Corporal
6469
Northumberland Fusiliers
8th Bn.
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
1914 /15 Star, British War and Victory medals
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
HELLES MEMORIAL
Panel 34 to 36.
Turkey (including Gallipoli)
Headstone Inscription
N/A
UK & Other Memorials
Hemel Hempstead Town Memorial, St John the Evangelist Church Memorial, Boxmoor
Pre War
Sydney John Chandler was born on 2 June 1892 in Trowbridge, Wiltshire, the son of George and Jane Chandler, and baptised there on 14 August 1892 at Holy Trinity Church. He was one of three children.
On the 1901 Census the family were living at Kington St Michael, Wiltshire where his father was a Police Constable. Sydney and his older sister Dorothy were educated at Kington St Michael Church of England School on 20 October 1898 soon after arriving in the village. They left on 5 May 1902 when their father was transferred to the Hertfordshire Constabulary and the family moved to Hemel Hempstead. Sadly his father was forced to retire from the Police in 1909 when he suffered an illness which resulted in paralysis.
By the 1911 Census he was living at Westbury Manor Gardens Bothy, Brackley, Bucks, the home of Sir Samuel Scott, 6th Baronet, retired soldier and Member of Parliament, where he was one of five full time domestic gardeners. His parents had moved to Paradise Hill, Hemel Hempstead, where his father was a Police Pensioner.
Sydney later changed employment as he was at Ashington, Northumberland before the war.
Wartime Service
Sydney enlisted in Sheffield, Yorkshire and joined the 8th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, being sent to Belton Park, Grantham for basic training, followed by a move to Witley near Derby for final training. The Battalion was mobilised on 30 June 1915 and sailed from Liverpool on the SS Aquitania bound for Murdos on the Gallipoli peninsula. During the voyage the ship was attacked by enemy submarines which fortunately missed the ship and the Battalion arrived at Murdos on 10 July.
They took part in the landing at Suvla Bay on 6 August which was intended to break the deadlock of the Battle of Gallipoli, but did not achieve that objective and resulted in the same stalemate conditions.
On 19 August the 8th Battalion was ordered to attack an entrenched Turkish position and, although they almost reached the enemy trenches, there was intensive enemy opposition with rifle and heavy machine gun fire. The Battalion were forced to retire with significant casualties. Eight officers were wounded or missing and 23 other ranks were killed, 141 wounded and 90 missing.
Sydney was of those killed on 19 August 1915, aged 23. He has no known grave and his name is commemorated on the Helles Memorial, Turkey.
Additional Information
His mother received a pension of 10 shillings a week and a war gratuity of £4. His pay owing of £1 19s 6d was split equally between his mother, brother Victor and sister Dorothy. His brother Victor served in the Royal Navy in the war and stayed in the service until 1926. His father died in 1913 aged 50, followed by the deaths of his mother and sister Dorothy from Spanish Flu in December 1918.
Acknowledgments
Brenda Palmer
Jonty Wild, www.dacorumheritage.org.uk., www.hemelheroes.com.
