Name
Frederick Shortland
1882
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
15/08/1917
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Private
9767
Yorkshire Regiment
1st Bn.
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
British War and Victory medals
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
KARACHI 1914-1918 WAR MEMORIAL
Pakistan
Headstone Inscription
N/A
UK & Other Memorials
Watford Borough Roll of Honour, Not on the Abbots Langley memorials, We are not aware of any WW1 memorial in Bricket Wood
Pre War
Frederick Charles Shortland was born in 1882 in Bricket Wood, Herts the son of John and Julia Shortland (nee Chandler) and baptised on 6 August 1882 at St Lawrence's Church, Abbots Langley, Herts, where his parents had married on 24 August 1878.
On the 1891 Census the family were living at Kitters Green, Abbots Langley, where his father was working as a general labourer and had moved to Garden Road, Abbots Langley by 1901 at which time Frederick was working as a carman on a farm.
His father died at the end of 1910, aged 60 and on the 1911 Census his mother was living at 3 Garden Road, Abbots Langley with sons Joseph, John and Arthur and daughters Alice and Agnes.
Frederick joined the army in December 1909 and was said to be living in Abbots Langley when he enlisted in Canterbury, Kent. By the 1911 Census he was recorded on the Census as a Private with the 21st (Empress of India's) Lancers at Abbassia Barracks, Cairo, Egypt.
His mother later lived at 5 Diamond Road, Watford, Herts but died in 1922.
Wartime Service
Frederick was a serving soldier in India at the outbreak of war and at some point was transferred to the 1st Yorkshire Regiment. According to the National Roll of the Great War he was stationed at various garrison towns until eventually being sent to the North Western frontier. He was severely wounded during a raid and subsequently died of his injuries at Rawalpindi hospital on 15 August 1917.
Although he is buried at one of the many cemeteries in India (including Pakistan), because of the difficulty in maintaining them, it was decided to commemorate those casualties on a memorial and his name is commemorated on the Karachi 1914-1918 War Memorial.
Additional Information
His mother received a war gratuity of £17 10s. Pay owing and gratuities totalling £60 17s 1d were divided between his mother Julia, brothers Joseph and John, and sisters Lilian, Agnes and Alice. His mother received a pension in respect of Frederick and his brother Arthur who both died of wounds, but the amount of pension is not known.
Brother to Arthur who served with the London Regiment and died of wounds on 22 August 1918, and brother to Joseph who served with the East Surrey Regiment from 1914, was wounded three times, invalided out of the army in October 1917 and survived the war.
Younger brother John (Jack), enlisted at Bedford in September 1914, serving with the East Surrey Regt, eventually being discharged in October 1917 as no longer physically fit for war service. He was awarded the Silver War Badge and died in 1929 aged 35.
Acknowledgments
Brenda Palmer
Jonty Wild
