Richard Jones

War Service

It is not known when Richard joined the 2nd/4th Battalion, King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry.
On the 24 and 25 August 1918, together with other battalions of the 187th Infantry Brigade, Sergeant Richard Jones of the 2nd/4th King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry Battalion once again moved into the trenches, this time to the west of the village of Ervillers. Other battalions of the brigade were ordered to make an attack on the village of Mory, a distance of approximately one mile away. Richard and his battalion were held in reserve, but it was not long before the 2nd/4th K.O.Y.L.I. were in action. The attack made by other battalions had stalled and they became trapped in open ground. This area is almost the same piece of land fought over in the spring of 1917, when Sergeant Beevers and Private Frank Ingham of Altofts lost their lives.
Extracts from the Battalion War Diary state:
“battalion was ordered to move forward and secure the high ground but they too became trapped in an unsheltered position. Low flying aircraft soon located their position and began to bomb. Then enemy shelling increased. Our guns continued to shell the retreating enemy. One of the shells exploded a gas shell dump releasing gas in a westerly direction. The enemy began to make a counter attack but were repulsed, sustaining heavy casualties inflicted by our Lewis gun crews. On the morning of 28 August, the battalion moved back to a position east of Courcelles”. (Courcelles-Le-Comte).
“The total number of casualties during this action was 11 Officers and 199 other ranks.”
Sergeant Richard Jones, aged 23 years, did not return alive with the remnants of the battalion on the morning of 28 August 1918. He died of his wounds on 27 August 1918 and now rests in Gomiecourt South Cemetery, located almost three miles distance by road today from the village of Moray and almost one mile from the village of Ervillers, the area where Richard’s Battalion went into the trenches the day before. His parents received the tragic news of their son’s death at their home in 19, Brook Street, Lee Brigg, Altofts.
The inscription on Richard’s headstone reads:
“HOW WE MISS HIM
NONE CAN TELL
FROM HIS LOVING MOTHER
FATHER SISTERS AND BROTHERS”
The following appeared in the Wakefield Express on 12 October 1918:
“JONES – In loving memory of our dear son and brother Sergt. Richard Jones of Brook Street, Altofts, K.O.Y.L.I. who was killed in France, August 27th, 1918, aged 23 years.
No mother’s care did him attend,
Nor o’er him did his father bend;
No sister near to shed a tear,
Nor brother his last words to hear.
From his ever loving Father and Mother, Brothers and Sisters and Brother Fred in France and Brother Cyril (wounded) and Brother Harold in V.A.D. Hospital.”
*The Voluntary Aid Detachment was a voluntary unit of civilian personnel providing nursing care for military personnel. V.A.D.s were not under the control of the military. The VAD nurses worked in both field hospitals close to the battlefield and places of recuperation in Britain.
“Somewhere abroad in a soldier’s grave,
Lies my dear nephew amongst the brave,
O God, how mysterious and strange are Thy ways,
To take my dear nephew in the best of his days.
From his loving Uncle and Aunt and Nieces in Benson Lane.”

Family Life

Richard was born in Normanton in 1895 and baptised on 28 February 1895. He was the fourth child of Richard and Mary Ann Jones. Both parents originated from Dudley (then in Worcestershire). At the time of Richard’s baptism, the family lived at 17, Pontefract Road, Hopetown, Normanton.
There were further additions to the family by 1901. Richard now had five sisters and a younger brother.
Sometime during the next decade Richard’s family moved from 17, Pontefract Road, Hopetown to live at 19, Brook Street, Lee Brigg, Altofts. Lizzie, Herbert and Fred were additions to the family by 1911. Richard followed his father Richard (Senior) into the mining industry where they both worked as “hewers”.