Frederick Hunton

War Service

Frederick enlisted at Normanton (his home address at this time is not known) and joined the West Yorkshire Regiment as a Private, later promoted to Lance Corporal.
Below, an extract from a report dated 20 April 1918 by G H Gater, Brigadier General, commanding 62nd Infantry Brigade:-
“Holding of the Wytschaete Sector to 16th April 1918 and the attack and counter-attacks on 18th April 1918.”
“I should like to also draw attention to the very gallant behaviour of the 1/7th West Yorkshire Rgt. On the critical afternoon of the 11 April when the Brigade holding the MESSINES sector, was driven back leaving my right flank perilously exposed the 1/7th West Yorkshire Rgt. was moved up at very short notice from PARRET Camp to form a defensive flank. Under very heavy shelling the Battalion moved forward splendidly and their steadiness undoubtedly saved the situation. From that evening until the morning of the 16th the Battalion held the Right Subsector of the Brigade front.”
Lance Corporal Frederick Hunton, aged 28 years, was killed in action on 15 April 1918 whilst serving with his battalion. Frederick has no known grave and he is remembered on the Tyne Cot Memorial in Belgium.
In 1918 Frederick’s wife Gertrude was living at 25, Broom Terrace, Rotherham and Frederick’s parents, William and Isabel, were still living in Kirklington when they were informed of Frederick’s death.

Family Life

Frederick Hunton’s link with Altofts is very tenuous. He was born in Didsbury, Lancashire in 1890, the second child to William Thomas and Isabel Hunton. They already had a daughter, Alice Ann, who was four years old when Frederick was born. The family then lived at 7, Grove Lane, Didsbury.
By the time Frederick was eleven years old in 1901 the family had moved to Yorkshire. Frederick’s father was now the innkeeper of a public house named the “Black Horse Inn” in Kirklington Upsland in the Bedale district of Yorkshire. There had also been additions to the family: Frederick now had another four younger sisters – Edith, Isabel, Eliza and Mabel.
In 1911, at the age of 21, Frederick was living in a boarding house of Mrs Leah Fisher and her elderly sister Mrs Jane Runcorn (both widows) at 1, King Street, Altofts. This is the only documented link I have established with Altofts. Frederick at this time was employed as a railway clerk, quite possibly working at the railway station in Normanton.
In the autumn of 1915 Frederick married Gertrude Foster in Rotherham in the West Riding of Yorkshire.

Tyne Cot Memorial