| Description | Work completed by volunteer includes the following information:
John Mason Bentley was born in Sherburn, on 13 Jun 1884. He was one of eleven children born to Thomas Bentley and Emily Bentley (nee Horsley) who had married in 1875. Emily was from Sherburn but Thomas, a tailor, originally came from Kilnwick. The family lived in Sherburn until the mid 1880s when they moved to Kilnwick, living initially on Beverley Road and then at Kilnwick Lodge where Thomas had his tailoring shop. John is recorded in the 1901 census as being a “groom/yardsman” at Farm lodge in Beswick but later he became a chauffeur. On 15 Oct 1910 at St Matthews, Hull John married Ethel Railton, born Driffield in 1887, a domestic servant. They lived on Cave Road at Elloughton. Their first child, Violet, was born in 1916, by which time the family had moved into east Hull.
John enlisted early in the war and on 26 Jul 1915 he arrived in France. He served in the Army Service Corps (ASC) and it seems that in the light of his driving skills served in the Mechanical Transport Section. The ASC were a logistical organisation and were responsible for transporting food, ammunition and supplies from supply depots near the French coast towards the front lines. He was awarded the War and Victory medals in addition to the 1914-15 Star.
After the War John returned to Hull and worked in the motor transport industry. In the 1939 Register he is recorded as a driver and mechanic and living in Sherwood Avenue, Hull. John and his wife Ethel had two further children, Robert born 4 Aug 1919 and Sydney born 1921. Ethel died in 1934. John married for a second time in late 1938 to Beatrice Aiken, from London, born in 1901. John died in Hull in 1963, aged 79.
Includes photograph, information taken from census, military records, Commonwealth War Graves, newspapers |