| Description | Work completed by volunteer includes the following information:
William Percival Tye was born the 3 Aug 1899 in Hull, the son of John Henry Tye and Julie (nee Percival). By 1914 John Henry Tye, was in charge of the Beverley Rifle Range and the family lived in the attached cottage in Lord Roberts Road.
William enlisted in the 4th Battalion East Yorkshire Regiment on 10 Oct 1914, when he was fifteen years old, as he was too young to join his Regiment at the Front, he was obliged to wait until he was eighteen, the official age for service abroad. He was posted to France in early 1918. His arrival coincided with the German Spring Offensive and he was captured on 10 Apr 1918 during the heavy fighting around the Lys crossing, near Estaires. He was imprisoned at Fort Macdonald, Lille, where the British soldiers were put into a wire cage and only allowed five minutes a day in the fresh air. Fort MacDonald became known as 'The Black Hole of Lille'. He was transferred to Freidrichsfeld and eventually to Dinslaken in Germany where the British prisoners of war were forced to work in a coal mine. They received very little food, only a 'small quantity bread and barley soup for the day'. Following the Armistice, William was released on 30 Nov 1918.
William stayed in the Army and served with the 2nd Battalion East Yorkshire Regiment in Iraq. He was awarded the General Service Medal and Clasp in 1923.
William married twice firstly in 1925 to Annie Scrivener, who died in 1928, following the birth of their son, Raymond. Then in 1930 to Louisa Caroline Dora Green. They had two sons, William Percival Tye, born 1932, and John Tye, born 1934. In 1939 William and Louisa were living with her parents in Blyth, Northumberland and he was working as a postman.
William Percival Tye died on 27 Apr 1975 in Bridlington, aged 75. Louisa died in 1994, aged 91.
Includes photograph, information taken from census, military records, Commonwealth War Graves, newspapers |