Wilfred Elliott

War Service

On 10 February 1913 Wilfred, at the age of 18 years and 3 months, enlisted at Pontefract into the York and Lancaster Regiment (Special Reserve). During 1913 and the spring and summer of 1914 Wilfred underwent training with the regiment. Three months after the declaration of war Wilfred received his posting to join the 2nd Battalion York and Lancaster Regiment, arriving in France on 9 November 1914.
Ten days later Wilfred was sentenced to ten days “field punishment No 1”. This was a humiliating form of punishment imposed for minor offences such as drunkenness. The punishment entailed the soldier standing full-length fastened by hands and feet to a fixed object such as a post or gun wheel for up to two hours a day, often one hour in the morning and one hour in the afternoon.
The battalion had the task of digging trenches, among other duties, at various locations around the Ypres, St. Jans Cappel, Armentieres and the Bailleul area. Whilst carrying out their duties the men had to endure heavy artillery shelling, rifle fire and the new threat of a gas attack. On 22 April 1915, German forces launched the first major gas attack of lethal chlorine gas along the front at Ypres, Belgium.
“Field punishment No 1” did not have a lasting effect on Wilfred; as again, on 17 May 1915, he received another eight days punishment.
Extracts from entries in the Regiment Diary confirm that during the period 1 June to 5 June the battalion was in the trenches near St. Jans Cappel where they sustained casualties: “17 men wounded and 3 men killed”.
Official government documents state, “Private Elliott, Killed in Action, 5 June 1915”, 12 days after completing his second sentence of field punishment No. 1 and only six months after his posting to the Regiment. Wilfred was just 20 years old.
Wilfred’s name is one of the 54,000 officers and men, including the five men of Altofts who have no known grave, remembered on the Menin Gate Memorial, Ypres.
Along this road thousands of allied troops marched to the front, many of them never to return, they include: Wilfred Elliott, William Arthur Wales, Ernest Goldsbury, Samuel Tudor Hudson and Charles Ingham, all young men from Altofts.
The town of Ypres, or as it is known today “Leper”, was almost obliterated by German shells but was successfully defended throughout the war by British and Commonwealth forces and never lost.

Family Life

Wilfred was born in Warmfield in 1895, the son of William and Elizabeth Elliott who were both born in Derbyshire. Wilfred, his parents and siblings: Harriet, John, Harry, Charles, Mary, James, Francis Daisy and his cousin Frank, moved from Warmfield to 10, Lockes Row, Altofts around 1897. After the move to Altofts Elizabeth gave birth to three more children: Margaret (Maggi), Sam and Ada.
In the twenty years up to her fortieth year Elizabeth had given birth to twelve children. Sadly, Wilfred’s father William died in 1908 leaving Elizabeth to raise the family alone. Harriet and John left the family home sometime before 1911. Ten-year-old Sam and the younger girls were still at school and the remainder of the boys were working at the coalmine. Wilfred, now 16 years old, worked on the surface, picking stones and debris by hand from the coal as it came out of the mine. Later he would work underground, employed as a “Trammer”. This work entailed manually pushing or pulling coal tubs (small wagons run on rails) full of coal away from the coalface ready for hauling to the pit shaft by pony or mechanical rope haulage. Working with just the light of a small oil lamp in the dark in dusty and cramped conditions, it is understandable why Wilfred took the chance to change his life.

Menin Gate Memorial, Ypres