Private GEORGE PRIOR
21, Cranworth Road, Winchester
Service number 907538. 5th Battalion, Canadian Infantry
Killed in action, France, 9 April 1917
Life Summary
George Prior was born in the village of Dean, Bedfordshire, on 7 February 1884, the son of George Thomas Prior and his wife Sarah. George Jnr spent his early years with his family in farming communities in eastern England before emigrating to Canada before the Great War. After his mother’s death his father remarried and moved to Winchester, and this appears to be the reason his name appears on the Fulflood and Weeke memorials. George served with the Canadian Corps and was killed in the attack on Vimy Ridge in 1917.
Family Background
George Prior Snr was born on 21 October 1847. His birthplace is given variously as Alconbury, Huntingdonshire, and Leighton, Bedfordshire. George Snr’s father, Benjamin, was a farmer who had been born in Sawtry, Huntingdonshire, in about 1822. In 1851 he was farming 360 acres in Leighton, Bedfordshire, employing 12 labourers. George’s mother was born Elizabeth Sanderson in Glatton, Huntingdonshire, in about 1825.
George Prior Snr married Sarah Braybrooks sometime in the late 1860s or early 1870s. Sarah had been born in Spaldwick, Huntingdonshire (now Cambridgeshire), in 1845 and was the daughter of Thomas and Sarah Braybrooks. Thomas, who was born in Hitchen, Hertfordshire, in about 1806 was a master fellmonger – a dealer in hides or skins, especially sheepskins.
By 1881 George Prior was running 546-acre Old Farm in Wigsthorpe, Northamptonshire, employing four men and four boys. At this stage he and Sarah had five children, all born in Wigsthorpe – Benjamin, aged nine, Florence, aged six, five-year-old Thomas, Elizabeth, aged three, and Mary, who was just ten months old. The family employed a domestic servant and a nursemaid.
Ten years later the Priors were living at The Grange in Wingland, near King’s Lynn, Norfolk. George Snr was still a farmer. Benjamin, the elder son had left home, leaving Thomas, Elizabeth, Mary and seven-year-old George Jnr. He had been born in Dean, Bedfordshire, so it appears the family had been at another farm between leaving Wigsthorpe and arriving at Wingland.
George Prior Snr, who lived in Cranworth Road, Winchester.
He would have ensured his son’s name appeared on
the Weeke and Fulflood war memorials
Sarah Prior died in 1895, her death being registered in nearby Holbeach, Lincolnshire. Three years later, on 17 November 1898, George Snr remarried at St Peter’s Church, Paddington, London. His new wife was Emily Etheridge, the daughter of the late Charles Etheridge, described as a farmer on the marriage certificate. The same document recorded George as being a widower, aged 51, and living at Wingland, Norfolk. Emily was living at 49, Chippenham Road, west London.
Emily, one of five siblings, had been born in Winchester in 1865 so she was some 18 years younger than her husband. Her father Charles worked as a cattle dealer and had been born in Winchester in about 1819. Her mother Jane was born in Stockbridge in about 1825. In 1871 the Etheridges were lodging at 16, High Street, Winchester.
By 1881 Emily’s parents appear to have both died and she was living at 18, Eastgate Street with her brother William, 34, a clerk in the Winchester births, marriages and deaths records office, and sister Elizabeth, 30. Emily, then 16, was working as a milliner. The three siblings were at the same address ten years later with Emily employed as a draper’s assistant. She obviously moved to London sometime over the next few years as that is where she was living when she married George Snr in 1898. It is unclear where George Jnr lived after his father remarried, but he probably remained in eastern England working on farms - he gave his occupation as farmer on his enlistment papers in 1916. In 1901 his sister Mary was living and working as a housekeeper in the home of her uncle James Wilkinson in Great Haddington, Northamptonshire. She was still there in 1911.
In the 1901 Census George Snr and Emily were living at the Farm House, Wingland, Norfolk, along with a domestic servant. However, there is no sign of George Jnr or any of the other children from his father’s first marriage. In 1902 Emily gave birth to a daughter, Emily, followed by a son, Arthur, the following year.
By 1911 the Priors had moved to Winchester and were living at Longmeade, a house in Fairfield Road with their two children and one servant. George Snr, by then 63, was recorded as being a retired farmer. By 1917 the family had moved to a larger house nearby at 21, Cranworth Road (the address then and now).
It is possible that George Jnr retained contact with his father, and he may even have come to live with him briefly in Winchester. However, there are also indications that father and son may have drifted apart, particularly in George Jnr’s decision to name his sister Mary, rather than his father, as his next-of-kin on his enlistment papers. In 1916 Mary was living at Shawington, Newton Road, Rushden, Hertfordshire.
21, Cranworth Road, Winchester - home to George Prior's
father and stepmother by 1917 and his address in the WWSR
George Jnr emigrated to Canada sometime before the Great War, almost certainly to make a new life for himself. He settled as a farmer in Candahar in the rich farming belt of Saskatchewan province.
Great War Record
George enlisted with the Canadian Corps at Regina, Saskatchewan, on 28 March 1916. He served in the 5th Battalion, Canadian Infantry, also known as the Western Cavalry, which recruited in the provinces of Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. On George’s attestation papers his date of birth is given as 7 February 1887, rather than 7 February 1884. This error was probably made when the original hand-written document was typed up – it is highly unlikely that another George Prior born on the same day of the same month in Bedfordshire also enlisted with the Canadian Corps.
The 5th Battalion Canadian Infantry had been raised on 10 August 1914 and departed for Britain on 29 September 1915. Training and reorganisation commenced upon arrival in Britain the following month. The battalion entered the theatre of operations in France on 14 February 1915, where it fought as part of the 2nd Infantry Brigade, 1st Canadian Division, in France and Flanders until the end of the war.
It is not known when George transferred to France or the extent of his service at the front before he died. All that is known for certain is that he died, aged 33, on 9 April 1917, the first day of the Battle of Arras. George’s battalion had set off in driving sleet to attack German positions near Neuville-St-Vaast, a village which today stands about two miles south of the Canadian Memorial on Vimy Ridge. George was hit in the head by shrapnel from an exploding enemy shell and killed instantly. His body was never found.
George Prior’s attestation paper dated 28 March 1916 –
note the error with his date of birth
Family after the Great War
After the war George Prior’s father and stepmother continued to live in Winchester. George Snr died on 28 November 1934 at Sarum Road Nursing Home, aged 87. Probate records show that he was living at 37, Stuart Crescent, Stanmore, Winchester, when he died. George left £725 7s 1d to his widow Emily and their son Arthur who by then was working as a clerk. Emily Prior died in Southampton in 1944, aged 79.
Probate for George Jnr’s estate was not granted until 25 April 1935, more than 17 years after his death. He left £1,014 8s 3d to his sister Mary in England. Mary Prior never married. In 1939 she and her sister Florence, also a spinster, were living together in Poole, Dorset. Mary was living in Southbourne, Bournemouth (in a house named Wingland), when she died in December 1975 at the age of 95. George Jnr’s sister Elizabeth also remained unmarried. She lived in Boldre, near Lymington, Hampshire, towards the end of her life and died in Lymington Hospital in 1959, aged about 81. It is not known what became of Florence or George’s brothers.
Medals and Memorials for George Prior
Canadian National Vimy Memorial, Pas de Calais, France
Private George Prior was entitled to the British War Medal and the Victory Medal. He is commemorated as G. Prior (above) on the Canadian National Vimy Memorial, Pas de Calais, France, and on the memorials at St Matthew’s and St Paul’s churches, Winchester.