Tag: WW1

Our first loss in the Great War

Frederick William Honeysett (43968) was a driver in K Battery of the Royal Horse Artillery and he was killed in the retreat from Antwerp, in Belgium on 20 October 1914. He was on active service in Flanders for only 12 days and was 26. He appears to be the earliest loss in the extended Honeysett/Hunnisett family.

Frederick joined the regular army in 1907, when he was 19. He had been a groom and his father was a coachman, so the Royal Horse Artillery looked a good fit. The RHA manned the lighter mobile horse drawn guns (the Royal Field Artillery had bigger guns!) and usually each battery supported a cavalry brigade.

Frederick and his original X battery were stationed in Mdhow, India in the 1911 census. His new battery, K, was in the Cavalry Barracks at Christchurch, Dorset on the 01 August 1914 and they were quickly mobilised.

K Battery landed at Ostend, Belgium on 08 October 1914 as part of the XVth Brigade RHA supporting the 7th Cavalry Brigade. They then moved to Bruge.

K Battery arrived in a retreat or was it a rout?

The Belgians had been overrun by the German Army and supported by French forces and the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) were retreating towards the Yser River, close to the border with France. Each side was trying to keep the advantage of sea access along the Yser River and the Leperlee (canal to Ypres from the sea).

On the “Lives of the first world war” website, Frederick’s entry has this information about his death written by the History Officer, K Battery, RA.

“Dvr Honeysett was killed in the wagon line as the battery prepared to withdraw from Passchendale. There was no time for burial so his body was left at a farm in Moorslede”.

Both places mentioned are nor far from Ypres, slightly to the North-East.

Frederick has no known grave and is commemorated on the Menin Gate at Ypres. I have not found him on a Sussex war memorial so far. He was awarded the 14 Star medal and clasp. The 1914 star was awarded to those who had served in France or Belgium between 05 Aug to midnight 22nd November 1914. The clasp was an additional award for those who had operated within range of enemy mobile artillery in the same time period. However the clasp had to be claimed personally, so Frederick would never have received it. In addition he was awarded the British War and Victory Medals.

He had given his father, Henry, as his next of kin and he received £22 3s 2d on behalf of his son.

Frederick’s family

Frederick William was born in 1888 to Henry & Kate Honeysett. He had an older brother, Harry, several younger sisters and two younger brothers, Charles and Jack. They lived in Mountfield, Sussex (near Battle) where Henry was a coachman. Frederick, Charles and Jack all joined the armed services either before the war or very early on.

Harry (b. 1886)

Harry is a little difficult to trace, so if you know any more, please contribute. By the 1901 census he’d left home and was a servant at Manor House Stables in Bexhill. A Harry Honeysett is then found in the Waterford area of Ireland where he was prosecuted for driving a motor car without due care and attention in 1905 and 1907 and paid the fines for doing so. This man is also on the 1911 Irish census in Waterford with the profession of a mechanic and born in England. Although he sounds just the kind of man the Army would want, I haven’t pinned him down yet!

Possible census entry for Harry on the 1911 Irish census

Charles Traughton (b. 1897)

Eridge Castle

Charles T signed up in Maidstone on 15 November 1915 on his enlistment paper he added an extra “n” to his surname, Honneysett and kept it like that for the rest of his life. He had been living and working at Eridge Castle, as a labourer and joined the Royal West Kent Regiment as a Private.  He started in the 9th Battalion (reserve) and then was transferred to the 11th (service). He was trained in England until the start of May 1916 and then was transferred to France as part of the BEF.

His battalion engaged in these battles in 1916:

Flers-Courcelette 15-22 Sep – this was 3rd main phase of the battle of the Somme, it was also the first time tanks were used. The purpose was to punch a hole in the German defences which it did not achieve decisively and poor weather then stopped further assaults.

Translory Ridges 1-18 Oct – this was the last big attack in the Battle of the Somme in 1916 by the BEF and French forces with 159.000 allied casualties. The landscape by now had been destroyed and the weather very poor. The ground was described as a morass of liquid yellow-grey mud – men on foot were coated to the knees and movement off the roads became impossible. Guns jammed and provisions got soaked.

Charles survived for 161 days on the Somme before being transferred back to England. On 24 April 1917, he was discharged as medically unfit for service due to his wounds.

He received the British War and the Victory medals and also the Silver War Badge . This last was awarded to those who were honourably discharged due to sickness or injury.

After the war Charles married Florence A Lennox and they had a son, Harry Charles in March 1922. Unfortunately Florence died in 1928. Charles remarried in 1929 in Hampshire to Christine Sarah Violet Case. They had a daughter, Joy in 1931, another child’s details are closed on the 1939 “census”.
In 1939, the family were living in Gosport, Hampshire and Charles was working as a storehouse assistant in Naval Ammunitions, this was considered heavy work. Harry was an apprentice painter and decorator.

Is Charles your ancestor? Can you add more details to the story?

Jack Leonard (b.1894)

Jack signed up for the Royal Navy on 09 June 1913 for a 12 year engagement. His records call him John, which is of course the formal name that has a diminutive of Jack, but Jack Leonard Honeysett was baptised as just that. He had been working as a gardener and motor driver and been living at home.

He trained as a stoker and survived the war. He extended his service until March 1929, when he retired as a Leading Stoker. The Royal Navy advertised for recruits in the local newspapers pre-war and often led the adverts with a request for stokers.

He served on many ship during the war, some of them were:

HMS Dominion

Dominion – a battleship that operated as part of the Northern Patrol in 1914. This force formed a blockade to stop German trade

Aragon – a converted Royal Mail ship, she served as a troop ship taking part in the Gallipoli Campaign in 1915. Sunk in 1917, luckily Jack was elsewhere by then

Hecla – was a converted civilian should used as an offshore depot, when Jack was on the ship it was supporting the Second Destroyer Flotilla based in Belfast.

Hawkins- large battleship commissioned in 1917, based in the China Station. Her boilers were changed from coal fired to oil in December 1929, the prospect may have prompted Jack to retire!

He received the 14-15 star, awarded to those who served between 05 August 2014 and 31st December 2015. He also received the British War Medal and the Victory Medal.

After the war, Jack married Violet E E Walter in 1921.
He is found in the 1939 “census” living in Battle on Banks Farm as a RN pensioner. Jack was divorced.

Jack and Violet had one son, Derrick Jack born in 1922. In 1939 he was living in Battle with his mother, working as a clerk for a gypsom company and also working as a ARP dispatch rider.

Is Jack your ancestor, can you add more to the story?

Deep Ancestry

I have traced this branch of the family back to 1795 to a Warbleton,Sussex based family

This blog is part of an ongoing series providing the stories around the lives and families of those Honeysetts and Hunnisetts who died in the the Great War.

Find out more about your Hunnisetts and Honeysetts at http://hunnisett.one-name.net

It is also part of the 52 ancestors in 52 weeks challenge – First

Sources – in addition to Ancestry, FindMyPast and the GRO, these sources have been particularly useful

http://www.greatwar.co.uk/medals/ww1-campaign-medals.htm

http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie

http://www.lostheritage.org.uk/

www.curme.co.uk

https://www.freebmd.org.uk/

Hellingly boy buried in Egypt & what’s the railway connection?

Frederick Hunneysett was drowned on 31st December 1917 when the troop ship he was on, the Osmanieh,hit a mine just outside the harbour at Alexandria, Egypt and sank within 7 minutes. 199 people died that day. The previous day another troop ship, the Aragon, had been torpedoed in exactly the same place and 610 people died.

HMS Osmanieh

The troop ships held a mixture of troops and medical staff; the fact that there were nurses on both ships and the scale of the loss meant that there were survivors stories in the newspapers.

Hadra War Memorial Cemetery, Alexandria, Egypt

Frederick’s body was recovered, many were not, and his grave is with those of his company, the 98th Light Railway Company, Royal Engineers, in Alexandria, Egypt in the Hadra War Memorial Cemetery.

They were to support the war in Palestine by manning narrow gauge trains (the size of model trains)  that could quickly move supplies from the main supply dumps to refilling points close to the front line.

These were quick to build, relocate and repair and their widespread use towards the end of the war kept the guns firing and the soldiers eating. The British Army was rather late in adopting them but by the time of Frederick’s transfer their importance was recognised and men with railway experience were being moved from infantry units to the railway operating companies.

Frederick’s war

Frederick’s name was recorded on the list of Railwaymen who lost their lives in a special service in St Paul’s Cathedral. He is also recorded on Hellingly war memorial.

Garter
Courtesy of The Brighton Circle

Frederick had indeed got railway experience. He had joined the London, Brighton & South Coast Railway on 31 December 1906 as a porter at Hailsham, transferring to Norwood Junction as a passenger guard where he was working until he joined the army in Croydon.

Frederick’s service record is one of the “lost records”, so what is known has been reconstructed from other records. He was awarded the British Medal and the Victory Medal, but not the 1914/15 star, this suggests that he didn’t join the army until at least 1916. His medal card also shows that he started in the Queen’s Royal West Surrey Regiment and his medical record shows that he sprained his ankle in November 1916 at Corbie, a small town in the Somme, France. It also says he was a Lance Corporal. He then transferred to the Royal Sussex Regiment, date unknown. Finally he was transferred to the Royal Engineers, 98th Light Railway Company as a sapper (private) and his company was sent by ship to Alexandria, Egypt. They were to support the war in Palestine by manning narrow gauge trains (the size of model trains)  that could quickly move supplies from the main supply dumps to refilling points close to the front line. These were quick to build, relocate and repair and their widespread use towards the end of the war kept the guns firing and the soldiers eating. The British Army was rather late in adopting them but by the time of Frederick’s transfer their importance was recognised and men with railway experience were being moved from infantry units to the railway operating companies.

Frederick growing up

He was born on 14 Apr 1891 in Hellingly, Sussex to Cornelius and Sarah Jane Hunneysett, one of their 8 children. His mother was listed as his next of kin and his father received his war gratuity of £20 77s 10d

His father was born in Hellingly, and the family lived in Hellingly, then Hailsham, both addresses near the railway as Cornelius was a coal porter. Several of Frederick’s brothers also worked on the railway.

What Fred’s brothers did in the war and afterwards

Alfred Stephen (b1889) also joined the London, Brighton & South Coast Railway, but later than his younger brother. He started work as a railway porter on 13 May 1907. He was still living at home for the 1911 census so presumably worked near enough to travel from home. He married Mary B SHEEHAN in 1912 in Havant, Hampshire. He resigned from the Railway on 24 Apr 1914. I haven’t found any war service yet, so the easiest way to track his whereabouts is from his childrens’ births.

Mary Ann was born in Havant in 1915. However, Dorcas Agnes was born (and shortly died) in Sheffield in 1917. A further daughter, Constance, was born in Sheffield in 1920. Then came another move and Alfred T was born (and shortly died) in the Grimsby area in 1926. Unfortunately Mary B also died in 1926, leaving Fred with two daughters to raise. He married again, three years later to a young widow, Eleanor HENNESSY (nee REEVES), who already had a son, Jack.

Fred & Eleanor went on to have a child together, Frank Cornelius, in 1930 again born in the Grimsby area. By 1939, Fred and his family have moved to Holten le Clay in Lincolnshire, 5 miles south of Grimsby. The family have settled in this area, along the coastline.

Bertie Oliver, (b1892) was living at home in 1911, He was 18 and working as a groom. Unsurprisingly, he also joined the London, Brighton and East Coast Railway. He joined as a porter (lad) on 20 June 1914 and resigned on 7 Apr 1914.

His war service record hasn’t been found but his medal card shows that he was in the Royal Field Artillery, firstly as a gunner and then he transferred into the Territorial Force as a driver. He received the British War Medal and the Victory Medal, so joined at the earliest in 1916.

Bertie married Emma Olive HORNE in the last quarter of 1917, in the West Ham registration district in Essex, this includes Woodford where the couple were in 1939, Bertie working as a groundsman.They had two children, Joan and Norman.

Norman joined the Royal Navy and went down with his ship the HMS Orion in 1941, aged 17. He is commemorated on the Chatham War Memorial.

Frank (b1894) was still at home in 1911, working as a labourer. He joined up in 1915 at the age of 21. He joined the Royal Sussex Regiment as a private and was sent to France in July 1915. He survived the war earning the 1915 star as well as the British War and Victory medals. He returned to Hellingly, marrying local girl Louisa Kathleen PAGE in 1922. In 1939, they were in Upper Dicker, in the parish of Hellingly , Frank was working as a brick and haulage lorry driver.  Louisa’s brother Ernest and his family lived next door.

Alex Cornelius (1899) joined the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway as a porter (Lad) on 20 June 1914. Five days after he resigned on 07 April 1916, he joined the Royal Marines. He enlisted at Brighton at just 17 and at 5ft 9ins. He served on the Arty and the Ramilles. RM Arty was the old Eastney Barracks, a shore training establishment.

He then transferred to HMS Ramillies on 01 May 1917. Ramilles was a brand new battleship which was launched in June 1916 and commissioned on 01 September 1917. It is likely that Alex sailed on her maiden voyage. However the ship saw no active service during the war.

Alex was transferred to the Royal Fleet Reserve in 1920 and finally demobbed in June 1921. He also returned to Sussex, marrying Alice Caroline FARRANT in 1923. He also seems a to have rejoined the railway, as the couple lived at Junction, Polegate in 1939 and Alex was a railway shunter

Sources

Ancestry for

– UK, Railway Employment Records, 1833-1956

Findmypast for

– British Armed Forces, First World War Soldiers’ Medical Records

– War Memorials Register

– Soldiers Died In The Great War 1914-1919

Peter Singlehurst; The War Dead of the Commonwealth Alexandria (Hadra) War Memorial Cemetery, Egypt

Commonwealth War Graves Commission Debt Of Honour

https://www.greatwarforum.org

http://www.londonwarmemorial.co.uk

www.lbscr.org

https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/transport-and-supply-during-the-first-world-war


Fold3 for

– UK, WWI Pension Ledgers and Index Cards, 1914-1923  

– British WWI Medal Rolls Index Cards

– UK, Army Registers of Soldiers’ Effects  Fold3

https://www.cwgc.org/find-a-cemetery/cemetery/54600/alexandria-(hadra)-war-memorial-cemetery/

National Archives for

 – RAIL 1057/2179

Died in the Great War – Hunnisetts and Honeysetts

I’ll be working on the history of the Hunnisett and Honeysett family members that died in military service during the WW1, so check back to look for new links to their stories. If you know more, please get in touch

This blog is part of the Hunnisett/Honeysett One Name Family Study

A great way to show you recognise them is to visit their record on Lives of the First World War,  and then click remember. This site will be updateable to March 2019

A HONEYSETT, d. 1917, France

Albert Arthur HONEYSETT, b. Plumstead, London, d. 07 Nov 1918, 153870

Alfred HONEYSETT,b. Polegate, Sussex,  d. 16 Oct 1917, France, G/27678*

Alfred HONEYSETT, Borden, Kent, 14 Mar 1916, G/4876

Bertram Thomas HONEYSETT, b. East Dulwich, Surrey, d. 08 Sep 1918, France, 27316*

Cecil HONEYSETT, b. Brightling, Sussex, d. 30 Jun 1916, France, SD/2706

C H HUNNISETT, d. 1917, France

Charles Vincent HUNNISETT, b. Hanover Square, London, d. 11 Sep 1916, France, 1578 OR 1518*

Edwin Edward HUNNISETT,  d. 30 Jun 1918, France, Royal Navy F 24688*

Frank Victor HONEYSETT, b. Sidley, Sussex, d. 25 Sep 1915, France, G/1711*

Frederick HUNNEYSETT, b. 1891, Hellingly, Sussex, d. 31 Dec 1917, Egypt, 282716*

Frederick George HUNNISETT,  b. 1889, Oxford, d. 01 Apr 1918, France, 285725*

Frederick John HONEYSETT, b 1891, d. 17 Oct 1917, Royal Navy, K/8193*

Frederick William HONEYSETT, b. Battle, Sussex, d. 20 Oct 1914, Belgium 43968*

George HONEYSETT, d. 1916, France

George Henry HUNNISETT, b. 1880 St Leonards, Sussex, d.22 Mar 1917, Salonika, Greece, 27424*

George Russell HONEYSETT, b. 1898 Mereworth, Kent, d. 21 Mar 1918, France, 11816*

Harmen Charles HONEYSETT, b. 1892, d. 24 Feb 1917, 1719A – Australian Infantry*

Harry HUNNISETT, b. Ripe, Sussex, d. 03 Nov 1917, Israel/Palestine, 37318*

James George HONEYSETT, b Brightling Sussex, d. 30 Jun 1916, France, SD/2707*

Robert HONEYSETT, b. 1892 Hurstmonceaux, Sussex, d. 03 Sep 1916, France, SD/599*

Sidney HONEYSETT, b. Borden, Kent, d. 26 Oct 1917,

Thomas HONEYSETT, b. Hartfield, Sussex d. 09 May 1915, France, G/1306*

William HONEYSETT, d. 31 Jul 1917, Belgium, 532347*

William HONEYSETT,b. Sidley, Sussex, d. 09 May 1915, France, G/1099*

William Henry HONEYSETT, b. Ascot Berks, d. 31 Jul 1917, Belgium, G/236/27*

Shot down by a flying ace

Sergeant Mechanic Edwin Edward Hunnisett was the observer in a two seater DeHavilland biplane, piloted by Clifford James Moir, when it was shot down by Hans Goerth, a famous German pilot, over Mariakerker in Belgium on 30th June 1918.  He is commemorated on the Arras Flying Services Memorial, Fauberg d’Amiens, Pas de Calais, France.This is a memorial for those with no known grave.

DeHaviland Airco DH 4. Courtesy of www.wikidata.org

How did a 21 year old provisions assistant from Newhaven, Sussex come to be a founder member of the Royal Air Force ?

Services Record

Edwin joined the Royal Navy in 1916 and seems to have immediately joined the Royal Naval Air Service, training at their landbase HMS President.  Edwin belonged to the 17th Squadron, which served in France. He also spent some time at their Eastchurch base; this was a flying club on the Isle of Sheppey given to the RNAS in 1910 and by mid 1917 it opened as a Naval Seaplane Training School.

During the Great War, the Royal Navy was growing its own air arm,originally for reconnaissance and then later for bombing. This was in addition to the Royal Flying Corps, which was attached to the army. On 01 April 1918, both were amalgamated into the brand new Royal Air Force, and Edwin’s 17th Squadron became the 217 Squadron. He was based in Dunkirk at the time of the transfer.

On the 30th June 2018, Edwin and Clifford Moir (a Canadian member of the RAF),  flew on a mission in Belgium. Unfortunately they encountered Hans Goerth, and became the first of his seven recorded kills, thereby making themselves a place in the record books.

Family background

According to his Naval record Edwin Edward was born on 20 October 1895 in Newhaven, Sussex to Benjamin and Harriett (nee Daniels). However he was registered and baptised in 1896 as Edmund Edwin, his baptism at St Michael’s church in Newhaven was on 15 Nov 1896, so it appears that the Navy was a year out as all the other records tally.

His father, Benjamin, was a labourer, originally from Westham, Sussex and worked as a stevedore on the quay at Newhaven and then by 1911 on the railway. He and Harriet had seven children living in 1911. They had married in the Eastbourne district (Westham is in this district) between Sept- Dec 1891 and their first child, also Benjamin, was baptised on 13 December 1891 in Newhaven. Edmund/Edwin was still living at home in 1911.

He put his mother as his next of kin and his father received his war gratuity in 1919.

Brother Benjamin

Edmund’s older brother Benjamin, born 1891, was living at home in 1911, his occupation listed as ship’s steward.

Records for the London Brighton & South Coast Railway, show he then worked for them as a ganger. He was a Reservist and left for war on 09 October 1914. By the time he was demobilised in February 1919 and returned to the railway, he had married and started a family.

He married Elizabeth May Tubbs in the Newhaven district between January & March 1916. Both their sons unfortunately died in their first year, Benjamin S in 1918, and Edmund W in 1924. Their daughter May Dorine, born in 1917, married William J Gerard in 1934 and were both found in the 1939 Register, with a son William J, living in Newhaven.

Is this your family? Please get in touch if it is!

Edmund’s ancestor

I have traced Edmund’s family back to Peter Hennesit, born about 1550 in Sussex.

This blog is part of the Hunnisett and Honeysett Family Study

Sources

The National Archives of the UK, Kew, Surrey, England; Kew, Surrey, England; Air Ministry: Air Member for Personnel and Predecessors: Airmen’s Records; Series Number: AIR 79

www.findagrave.com

Royal Navy Registers of Seamen’s Services. ADM 188, 362 and 363. The National Archives of the UK, Kew, Surrey, England.

 The National Archives of the UK; Kew, Surrey, England; Collection: London, Brighton and South Coast Railway Company: Records; Class: RAIL414; Piece: 791

www.freeBMD.co.uk

Ancestry.co.uk and findmypast.co.uk for censuses and military records

Sussex Family History Group

www.canadiangreatwarproject.com

www.gro.gov.uk


The Mary Rose & Frederick Honeysett, both sunk in 1917

The Mary Rose left Norway on 16th October 1917, one of two British destroyers escorting 12 unarmed steamers laden with coal – 5 Norwegian, 1 Danish & 3 Swedish. Next morning when they were about 70 miles off Lerwick (Shetland Isles). they spotted two British warships coming towards them and signalled for recognition. They did not receive a reply because the ships were actually German Cruisers, modified to have a British “outline”. Frederick Honeysett was a stoker  in the engine room.   The German ships closed to 2,700m (3,000 yds)and then opened fire, firstly  on the other destroyer, HMS Stongbow, which was disabled. They then turned their attention to the Mary Rose, hitting the engine room immediately so the ship sat like a log in the water . All of the guns, except one, were disabled. Two of the crew, French and Bailey, continued to fire until the order was given to scuttle the ship and abandon it.

Few Survived

Only two officers and eight enlisted men survived so about 70 of the crew of the Mary Rose died,including Fred Honeysett. The crew of the Strongbow were lost and nine of the defenceless merchant ships were also sunk, killing around 250 men in total.

The Navy was criticised not only about the loss but also because the German ships got away. The response was that the only radios were on the two escorts and these were destroyed before any message was sent. A courtmartial was announced, a method of determining what happened. The court acquitted all the survivors but further details were not published in case they helped the enemy.

We’re not done yet!

Although the first reports in the newspapers were full of shock, distress and criticism of the Navy, later they were given an “official version” which described“plucky” Mary Rose taking on the German warships singlehanded, fighting to the last gun whilst declaiming cheerily “we’re not done yet”.

Who was Frederick Honeysett?

Frederick John Honeysett joined the Royal Navy on 11 August 1910, enlisting for 12 years,and had worked his way up from a Stoker, 2nd class to Acting Petty Officer.

He was born on 06 Feb 1892 to John Frederick & Sarah Ann (nee West) in Yalding, near Maidstone. His father John,  was a foreman on the roads. He had two siblings; Isa Dorothy born in 1894 and Russell George, born in 1897 in Mereworth, Kent.

Frederick married Alice Maude Crowhurst in late 1914. She received his widow’s pension but didn’t claim for any children.

Frederick is remembered on the Chatham Naval Memorial, for those lost at sea.  He is also on the World War I memorial at St Lawrence’s, Mereworth, Kent. The 100th year anniversary of the loss of the Mary Rose was commemorated in 2017, and in a  Facebook group, the  HMS Mary Rose & HMS Strongbow Memorial Group.

Do you have them in your family tree?

I have traced Frederick’s ancestors back to John Honeysett & Sarah Bailey (married 1773) in the Headcorn area of Kent.

Russell Honeysett

Russell is also listed on the memorial in Mereworth.

Mereworth WW1 memorial. Courtesy of Gravestone Photographic Resource, whose volunteers own the copyright

He had joined the Royal West Kent Regiment, but then was transferred to the South Irish Horse, 7th Battalion of the Royal Irish Regiment. Originally a mounted regiment, the South Irish Horse were retrained as Infantry in September 1917.

On 21 March 1918, the Germans launched the “Kaiserschlacht” (Kaiser’s Battle) a decisive attack planned to destroy the British Army across a wide area of the Somme. The tactics were to “punch a hole and things would develop”. The whole area had been devastated in previous battles and the British lines were in a poor state of repair and easily overrun.

The official regimental history shows that 2 companies of the 7th Battalion were posted in forward zones on the Somme. “They suffered terribly, not a man succeeded in escaping”. Russell died on 23 March 1918, aged 20.

No grave has been found for him but his memorial is at Pozieres, panel 30/31. Pozieres commemorates 14,657 British and South African soldiers who died between March and August 1918.

Russell’s names were reversed in his military records, where he is George R Honeysett. As a member of an Irish Regiment, he is also recorded in the Irish records.

A common story of the times, but John & Ann lost their two sons within 5 months of each other and both disappeared without trace.

Is this your family?

The surviving child, Isa Dorothy, married Frederick D Burbridge in Q4 1916. They appear in the 1939 register living in Gillingham,Kent.

Sources

www.gro.gov.uk

FreeBMD

British Newspaper Archive

www.gravestonephotos.com

www.ciroca.org.uk,

www.ancestry.co.uk

www.findmypast.co.uk

www.longlongtrail.co.uk

6 Sons sent to war, how many survived?

Charles Joe and Sophronia Honeysett had six sons and they all went into the armed services. The family featured in their local newspaper, the Kent & Sussex Courier on Friday 11 May 1917, when the youngest was being called up. At the beginning of the war, the local Sussex newspapers offered to take free pictures of the young men in uniform who had signed up and published their names in a front page list. By 1917 the tone was more measured and individual families were featured, their stories described in a factual way.

The article said that their eldest son, Charles (aged 27) was in the Royal Engineers, a sapper, and had previously been wounded. On recovery he had returned to his regiment but had been listed missing. The family had only just had news of him.

Their second son, William (aged 26) was a stoker on HMS Ganges.

The third son, Jim (was 25) a Lance Corporal in The Buffs, and went out to France as part of the British Expeditionary Force early in the war. He had been wounded three times, and now unfit for trench duties, was guarding German prisoners.

The fourth son, Tom, had been killed at the age of 21 on 09 May 1915. He was a private in the Royal Sussex Regiment and had died as part of the assault of “Hill 60”, not far from Ypres.

The fifth son, Fred (aged 21), had been wounded twice already and had recently transferred to the Royal West Surrey Regiment.

Alfred, aged 19, had just received his call up papers.

The Honeysett Brothers’ War History

Charles was 24 when he signed up on 13th October 1914 and he was a quarryman. He joined the Royal Engineers, Kent Fortress Company as a sapper. He got dysentery in late 1915 and had been invalided to England. He was put on the army reserve list on 25 July 1919 and received a small disability pension for malaria. He received the 1914-1915 star, The British War Medal and the Victory Medal.

William’s first service date was 19 Jan 1917, he had been a cattleman before he joined the Royal Navy. He was on the Pembroke II before he moved onto The Ganges. These were both training establishments. I have seen no record of active service.

Military information about Jim (actually William James) is hard to find but he was a labourer before he enlisted.  He was on the casualty list as wounded from 21st May 1915 , also from 17th August 1916 and was wounded again on 2nd Jan 1918. The Buffs were an East Kent Army Regiment and served in France & Flanders. James’ record features Etaples, where there were large medical facilities behind the lines. He went straight from the army to the Royal Airforce in April 1918 and became a batman.

Tom went out to France on 4th January 1915 and survived 4 months before being killed. He died on Hill 60 as the Germans sought to win back the hill using one of the first gas attack of the war.  At this time, there was no effective defence against the gas. Hill 60 was not really a hill but a spoil tip from a nearby railway cutting. It was fought over continuously during the war as the height gave the victor an advantage in a basically flat landscape.  It was completely devastated and was left as a wargrave.

Tom is commemorated on the Le Touret memorial, one of over 13,400 soldiers who died in Ypres area between October 1914 to September 1915 and who have no known grave. His family received the 1915 star, The British War Medal and the Victory Medal. There is a current archeological expedition taking place on Hill 60.

Fred signed a short service attestation at the start of January 1916 when he was 19. He started as a private in the 13th London Regiment but seems to have been transferred several times and was finally demobbed on Mar 02 1919. He received the British War Medal and the Victory Medal.

Alfred, currently no information found on Alfred’s war history. Do you know differently?

Did they survive?

In the 1939 register I’ve found the five sons and their father :-

Charles Joe is a widower, he is a retired bailiff and an inmate in an establishment in Uckfield. Alfred is also in Uckfield, he doesn’t appear to be married and he is also listed as an inmate.

Charley and wife Jane L, are listed at Tile Barn Farm, Uckfield, he is a heavyworker on the farm. This is the farm he worked on before he enlisted.

William is possibly in Tunbridge Wells, married to Agnes M.

Frederick is possibly in Lancashire married to Olive with children James & Freda (later Fisher)

Jim is  possibly  in Tunbridge Wells and married to Ivy.

Tracing back this Honeysett line – is it yours?

Charles Joe was born in 1865 in Guestling in East Sussex, to Joseph & Caroline Honeysett. His father Joseph was born in Stone, Kent in about 1822, but as a young man aged about 14 he was working as a labourer on a farm in Guestling. Joseph & Caroline Medlock married in 1862, stayed in Guestling and had 5 children.

Charles married Sophronia Jenner in Rye district in q2 1889, and the 1901 and 1911 censuses show they moved around on the Sussex/Kent borders and then they were in Hartfield, Sussex, during WW1. They had two daughters, Lily Flora and Annie in addition to the 6 boys.

This blog is part of the Hunnisett & Honeysett One Name Study.

Sources:

Kent & Sussex Courier – Friday 11 May 1917, British Newspapers Archive, www.bna.com

British Army War records 1914-1920 – Ancestry

www. forces-war-records.co.uk

1939 register – Findmypast or Ancestry

http://www.freebmd.org.uk/

https://www.gro.gov.uk

https://www.ww1cemeteries.com/

The first gas masks -https://simonjoneshistorian.com