Soldier Record
Ernest Whitehead
Contributed by: Mike Whitehead, on 2008-11-09
| Rank | |
|---|---|
| First Name | Ernest |
| Surname | Whitehead |
| Year of Birth | 1889 |
| Year of Death | 1975 |
| Regiment | Sherwood Foresters |
| Place of Wartime Residence | Newark, Nottinghamshire |
Ernest's Story
My father, who was a farm labourer, enlisted on 22nd October 1914 and served with the 1/8th Sherwood Foresters in France from 6th June 1915 to 25th April 1916. He returned to the UK after losing his right arm just above the elbow. He would never talk about that time and I don't even know the circumstances in which he was wounded.
Reading a contemporary history of the 1/8th Battalion, I can find no significant engagement around the few days preceding his return to the UK. It is interesting that, until I unearthed it, even my mother didn't know that it was the second time he had been wounded. After a period in Roehampton Hospital and discharge he became a Postman in October 1919, a job he held down until he was retired at 60 in 1949.
Apart from discharge papers etc. I have nothing from my father's time in WW1 and nothing survives at the War Office either.
A visit to the Post Office Archive Office in London revealed that following WW1 there was positive discrimination in the Civil Service in favour of disabled ex-servicemen.
My father, disabled in WW1, my personal hero.
No additional memories have been submitted