Arthur William Whitehand

Born: 30 August 1881

Died: 3 May 1917

Rank and Regiment: Sergeant T3/029014 H.T. in the Army Service Corps

Resting Place: St George’s, Hardingham, United Kingdom

Memorial: St Mary’s Church, Barney, United Kingdom and; St Mary’s Church, Earlham, United Kingdom

Arthur was born on 30th August 1881 in Hingham, and is recorded as having been baptised there on 2nd October 1881.

In the 1901 Census he was living with his parents William Whitehand aged 42 and Hannah Whitehand aged 40 at Low Street, Hardingham. Also living there was his sister Florence Elizabeth Whitehand, aged 10 – “Flossie”, as she was called by Arthur’s widow when giving family details in 1919. Arthur’s mother Hannah was a native of Hardingham.

On 27th September 1905 he married Ada Amelia Filby at Hingham Parish Church. They had no children. Ada is recorded as having been baptised at Hardingham on 2nd October 1881, her parents being William and Hannah (or Harriet). Great War casualty Arthur Websdale (q.v.) was Ada Whitehand’s cousin.

Arthur volunteered at an early stage in the Great War. His service papers are among those which survive, and show that he enlisted on 5th December 1914. We read that he was 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighed 136 lb (9 st 10 lb). He carried four vaccination marks on his left arm.

He is recorded at that time as living at Wood Farm, Barney (to the East of Fakenham). He was posted to France and is recorded as disembarking at Havre on 28th March 1915.

Evidently his service was satisfactory to his superiors, because by June 1916 he is recorded as “Acting Sergeant”, albeit “without pay”; though he seems to have blotted his copybook around that time by being disciplined for being drunk in camp. He was “severely reprimanded”.

His health, however, appears to have been uncertain; he is recorded as suffering from cholecystitis (inflammation of the gall bladder) in July 1915 and on 2nd August 1915 he was placed on a hospital ship at Dieppe to return to England. He did not return to France, serving on the home front (probably at Woolwich) from September 1915. He is then recorded as being hospitalised at the Military Hospital at Belton Park, Grantham (now demolished), where he died on 3rd May 1917, the cause of death being recorded on his service records as jaundice.

He was buried at Hardingham on 8th May 1917, and a note by the Rector in the Burial register records that:

“A file of RFC men from Hingham were bearers. Patients from Hardingham Hall Red Cross Hospital also attended. The RFC bugler sounded The Last Post”

He is also commemorated on the memorials at St Mary, Barney, and at St Mary, Earlham and Bowthorpe, Norwich.

His widow is recorded as living at 29 High Common, Hardingham, after his death; but in late 1918 she remarried Francis Hunt in Newton Abbot, and moved away, first to Devon and then to Woolwich.