Today marks the 144th anniversary of the birth of one Charles Bagnall, born in the Walsall Union Workhouse on 28th January 1882 to mother Susannah Bagnall, a Domestic Servant from Wolverhampton, and father unknown. A Railway Porter by trade, Charles married Gertrude Cotton at St. Georges Church, Walsall in 1904 when he was 22 years old and they went on to have 6 children together before his death on 13th May 1917. Charles Bagnall was my maternal great-grandfather.
On the 1st April 1912 evidence shows that Charles enlisted (or may have re-enlisted) with the 5th Battalion South Staffordshire Regiment in Walsall (service no: 7902), although official documentation strongly suggests that he had already served with the regiment prior to this date, possibly as early as the regiments formation in 1908, and there are also numerous pieces of evidence, though no ‘official proof’ which suggest that he also fought overseas during the Queen’s South Africa 2nd Boer War (1899-1902), but more about that later.
By mid-August 1914, Charles had transferred to the 46th (North Midland) Division Ammunition Column (service no: 148), who along with the 5th Battalion South Staffordshire Regiment were mobilised locally before travelling to Luton where they received further training following the outbreak of World War I on 28th July 1914. He was listed as a driver responsible for the transportation of artillery shells between gun posts and storage depots
On 22nd January 1915 however, Charles was honourably discharged from the army under King’s Regulation 392 XVI due to sickness which deemed him unfit for active service. Nonetheless, Charles refused to let this setback deter him and he soon passed another medical allowing him to re-enlist once again with the South Staffordshire Regiment (service no:17443), this time with either the 3rd or 4th Battalion, and owing to his years of military experience he was soon deployed for overseas service. He arrived in La Harve, France on 25th May 1915 where within a matter of days, he was transferred to the 2nd Battalion in order to help reinforce their heavily depleted numbers.
March, April, and May 1915 had seen the 2nd Battalion aiding the capture and hold of strategic positions along the German front-line through vicious face-to-face trench warfare, raiding and sniping missions, sporadic artillery fire, and spoiling missions at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle and Givenchy, before hunkering down in the trenches around Cuinchy in the Hauts-de-France region. The Battalion later played an active role in capturing and holding German trenches at the Battle of Festubert despite intense enemy artillery fire.
On 3rd July 1915, Charles was listed on a weekly wounded list which was reported in the Walsall Observer newspaper stating that he had been injured, but offering no further detail. He returned to Britain for treatment at a UK military hospital before returning to France in January 1916, this time with the 1st Battalion South Staffordshire Regiment which formed part of the 91st Brigade of the 7th Division, and with whom Charles rose to the rank of Lance Corporal.
The first half of 1916 saw the 1st Battalion make preparations for the Battle of the Somme whilst based at Corbie and Bray-sur-Somme in Hauts-de-France, and on 1st July 1916 were engaged in action with the British 4th Army, quickly capturing Mametz which was located at the southern end of the Somme battlegrounds from the German 2nd Army on the very first day. The 1st Battalion later went on to see action at the Battle of Delville Wood, Ginchy, and Beaumont-Hamel as part of the Somme campaign, as well as at Serre-les-Puisieux, and Crosilles.
On 12th May 1917 the 1st Battalion were once again called into the thick of the action in an attack on the German lines at the second Battle of Bullencourt, an attack which is believed to have produced some of the most fierce fighting of the latter part of the war. It is during this battle that on 13th May 1917, Lance Corporal Charles Bagnall, who had previously been mentioned in dispatches in the London Gazette failed to answer roll-call and was later presumed then announced as killed in action. To this day his remains have not been discovered and he is remembered with honours at the Arras Memorial (Bay 6), Pas-de-Calais, France along side 34,806 other fallen souls.
Owing to the loss of all known service records relating to Charles Bagnall prior to his enlistment (or re-enlisted) on 1st April 1912 as a result of German air raids carried out during Word War II, as well as those of thousands of other serving and non-serving soldiers and military personnel, we have to date been unable to find concrete proof that Charles did in fact serve overseas during the Queen’s South Africa 2nd Boer War, despite numerous pieces of evidence suggesting he did.
Firstly the image which accompanies this post depicts Charles wearing a Staffordshire Regiment Boer War uniform and cap badge, as well as a Queen’s South Africa 2nd Boer War medal complete with 4 campaign bars, all of which have been confirmed as correct by the official Staffordshire Regiment Museum based in Lichfield. There is also the fact that Charles’s name is omitted from the 1901 United Kingdom Census, suggesting that he wasn’t in the country at the time the census was taken, and there are also two separate articles taken from two separate local newspapers following Charles’s death which also suggests that Charles had served in South Africa, the first being from the Walsall Pioneer and District News, dated 16th June 1917, which stated ‘an old campaigner, having served through the Boer War’, and the second from the Walsall Observer on the same date which states ‘He served through the South African War’. Finally, the phrase ‘owing to his years of military experience’ also leads me to believe that Charles may have also served overseas prior to World War I, though this may also simply relate to previous military experience gained on home soil.
Despite such evidence however, Sonia and I have spent long hours trawling the internet and military records in order to seek that one piece of key evidence which will prove indefinitely Charles’s active service during the 2nd Boer War, and although we have identified 4 different C. Bagnall’s who did serve, one of whom we have already been able to eliminate from our search, the other three continue to lead to nothing more than dead ends, offering little to no information as to who these soldiers were, where they came from, or even which regiments they served. We will keep looking.
I obviously never got to meet my great-grandfather, though I’m sure had his youngest son Arthur, my grandad been anything like him at all, we’d have gotten along just fine. I may have only found out about Charles’s life during the past 18 month’s or so, but to me he will always be a hero.
Special thanks to The Staffordshire Regiment Museum for their assistance whilst compiling this information.
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