| Description | Work completed by volunteer includes the following information:
John Clements was one of the first Beverley soldiers to die in WW1. He was killed in action aged 34 on 30 Oct 1914 in the First Battle of Ypres. He has no known grave and is remembered on the Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing in Ypres, Belgium. He was awarded the 1914-15 Star posthumously.
John arrived on the continent on 5 Oct 1914 as a Private in the 2nd Battalion of the Yorkshire Regiment (The Green Howards), part of 21st Brigade and 2nd Division. He was killed in the course of a large German attack near Gheluvert, near Ypres, where his Battalion was defending the Menin Road crossroads.
John was born near Hessle in 1880 and then moved to Tickton and then Beverley. In 1891 the family was living in Holmechurch Lane. His father, George William Clements, born in Hotham, was a stone quarryman but became a tanner's labourer in Beverley; his mother was Alice Clements nee Tindale. John had three brothers, two of whom died in childhood, and five sisters. In 1901 he was employed at Hull Paint and Colour Inks Works as a labourer and lodging at Stoneferry. He married Kate Stavely of Beverley in Jan 1910 and moved back to Beverley, living at 35 Flemingate and then prior to the war at 32 Beaver Road. They had two children Winifred born Jan 1911 and John S born Jul 1913.
John Clements is remembered on the Beverley War Memorial at Hengate and on the East Riding Memorial in Beverley Minster. His name also appears on the Holmechurch Lane Street Shrine
Includes photograph, information taken from census, military records, Commonwealth War Graves, newspapers |