2nd Lieutenant ERNEST STEVENS
21-22, Sussex Street, Winchester (no longer stand)
1st Battalion, Seaforth Highlanders
(Previously 8248, Regimental Quartermaster Sergeant)
Died of wounds, France, 2 February 1915
Family Background
Ernest Stevens was born in Winchester on 9 May 1880, the first of the three children of Samuel and Emily Stevens. Samuel had been born in Winchester in 1858 and Emily (née Pottle) in Crawley, near Winchester, in the same year. The couple married in Portsmouth in 1879.
In the 1881 Census, Emily and baby Ernest were living with her brother John’s family at 20, Sussex Street, Winchester. Ernest’s father Samuel was away from home – his occupation was listed as a coachman. By 1891 the family, by then including a daughter, Ida, born in 1887, and a second son, Fred, born the following year, were living at Highland Terrace, Winchester. Samuel was working as a baker. Fred Stevens died in late 1891, aged three.
Early Military Career
No trace of Ernest has yet been found on the 1901 Census when his family’s address was 21, Sussex Street. His father gave his occupation as a baker, confectioner and a shopkeeper. In 1903 Ernest enlisted with the Seaforth Highlanders (Ross-shire Buffs, Duke of Albany’s) and was assigned to the 1st Battalion which was posted to India shortly afterwards.
On 30 September 1907, Ernest married Ethel White in Peshawar, Bengal (part of modern Pakistan). Ethel had been born in Bengal in 1884 so it is possible that her father, Edwin, had a military background. Two of the couple’s three daughters were born in India, Freda on 25 July 1908 and Doris in October 1912. By 1911 Ernest had reached the rank of Regimental Quartermaster Sergeant with the service number 8248. His address was ‘Chanbattia’, India.
Back in Winchester, Ernest’s sister Ida married William Barker, a schoolmaster, in 1909. The couple went to live with Ida’s father Samuel – by then a master baker – and mother Emily at 21-22, Sussex Street. (The houses, situated in Sussex Street between Newburgh Street and Gladstone Street, no longer stand.) The Stevens family remained there until 1920 when they moved to 11, Western Road, Winchester, which is the address given for Ernest in the Winchester War Service Register. This study, however, has opted for the Sussex Street address because, although almost all Ernest’s military career was spent overseas, this was a house that he knew and where his family lived during the Great War.
Great War Record
When war broke out in August 1914, the 1st Seaforth Highlanders were stationed in Agra, India, as part of the Dehra Dun Brigade of the 7th (Meerut) Division. Over the following weeks the battalion mobilised for war before embarking for France. On October 12, the Dehra Dun Brigade arrived at Marseilles where it was renamed the 19th Indian Brigade.
The brigade immediately moved to northern France to form part of the Indian Corps at the Battles of La Bassée, Messines and Armentieres. These actions, between 10 October and 2 November 1914, were a series of attempts by the German and Allied armies to envelop each other’s northern flank in what became known as the Race to the Sea. All proved inconclusive and both sides dug in from the Channel coast to the Swiss frontier, marking the start of trench warfare on the Western Front.
On 20 January 1915 Ernest Stevens was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the 1st Seaforth Highlanders. The battalion had suffered heavy losses among its officers in the autumn battles and urgently needed suitable replacements. Ernest may have impressed the Army authorities during the fighting, leading to him being recommended for promotion. However, he had little opportunity to make his mark as an officer. He died of wounds near Aubers Ridge, northern France, on 2 February 1915, less than a fortnight after being commissioned. It is believed he was shot in the head whilst part of a night-time trench-digging team.
Family after the Great War
Ernest’s father Samuel served as a Lieutenant on the home front with the Hampshire Regiment and survived the war. In the 1939 National Register, Samuel was recorded still living at 11, Western Road, together with a housekeeper. He died there in 1943 at the age of 84. Ernest’s mother Emily died in Winchester in 1926, aged 68.
At the time of Ernest’s death his wife Ethel was listed living at The Bungalow, Holly Road, Orpington, Kent, so she may have returned to England from India after the outbreak of war. By the following month (March 1915) she had moved to Winchester - probably to be with her in-laws – where she gave birth to a third daughter, Marjorie. Although Ethel was in England there is some suggestion that at least one of the older daughters remained in India to continue her schooling. Ethel applied for her husband’s 1914 (Mons) Star on 8 January 1918. She received £285 12s 1d in his will.
On 26 November 1920 Ethel Stevens and her three children left Liverpool aboard the ship City of Karachi bound for Bombay (Mumbai today). It is likely that she was returning to India to visit her parents, or even to live with them. No trace can be found of Ethel in any records after this date. Ernest and Ethel’s eldest daughter, Freda, remained single and died in Camden, London, in the second quarter of 1981, aged 72. Middle daughter Doris is believed to have married and she died in Bognor Regis, Sussex, on 20 April 2009, aged 96. Marjorie, the youngest daughter, married Gordon Cummins in Paddington, London, in December 1939. However, Gordon died in Newgate Prison in 1942, aged just 27. Marjorie never remarried and she passed away in London in 2013 at the age of 98.
Medals and Memorials for Ernest Stevens
Le Touret Military Cemetery, Richebourg-L’Avoue, Pas de Calais, France
2nd Lieutenant Ernest Stevens was entitled to the 1914 (Mons) Star, the British War Medal and the Victory Medal. He is buried in Le Touret Military Cemetery (above), Richebourg-L’Avoue, Pas de Calais, France (GR. II. D. 4) and his name appears on the memorials at St Matthew’s, St Paul’s and St Thomas’ churches, Winchester.