Name
Albert Edward Skeggs
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
09/08/1916
28
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Private
22153
Bedfordshire Regiment
6th Bn.
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Not Yet Researched
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
THIEPVAL MEMORIAL
Pier and Face 2 C.
France
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
Hatfield Town Memorial, Hatfield In Memoriam Book, St Luke's Church Memorial, Bishops Hatfield, Not on the St Albans memorials
Pre War
Albert was born in St Albans circa 1888, the son of Joseph and Jane Skeggs, later of 24 Primrose Cottages, Hatfield, Herts.
In the 1891 Census: Albert was 3 and living with his parents and sister at New Town Cottages. His father was a signal fitter. By 1901 Albert’s father had died and he was living with his widowed mother, Jane, and brother and sister in Newtown Cottages. Albert is working as an errand boy. The in 1911 Albert was still living with his widowed mother and siblings in New Town Cottages, and now working as a general labourer on the Salisbury Estate.
Officially recorded as born in St Albans and was living in Hatfield, Herts when he enlisted in St. Albans.
Wartime Service
He was Private 22153, 6th Battalion, Bedfordshire Regiment.
The National Roll of the Great War records that he volunteered in June 1915 and in the same year embarked for France where he took part in heavy fighting at Ypres, Albert, Central Maison, and other places. However, his medal suggested, by then absence of a 1914/15 Atar that it was later.
He was reported missing on August 9th 1916 at Delville wood, and later presumed to have been killed in action on that date.
The Bishop’s Hatfield Parish Magazine of December 1915, in the sixteenth list of men mobilised from Hatfield, recorded: “Skeggs, Albert E. – Newtown – Duke of Bedford’s Own Regt.” and in October 1916: “the relatives of the four “missing” Hatfield Men, Privates, Austin, Page, Panter and Skeggs still maintain their courage and hopefulness, but it is an agonising time for them.”
Awarded the Victory Medal and British War Medal.
Additional Information
Hatfield Parish Council Souvenir Committee Ledger: Mrs Jane Skeggs (Mother) of 24 Primrose Cottages, Hatfield, received an “In Memoriam and Roll of Honour Album”.
Acknowledgments
Gareth Hughes, Jonty Wild, Christine & Derek Martindale, Hatfield Local History Society (www.hatfieldhistory.uk)
