Lieutenant George Reginald Charles HEALE MC
10th (Service) Battalion Duke of Wellington's (West Riding) Regiment attached to No. 2 Company, 2nd Battalion

Date of birth: 26th January 1882
Date of death: 3rd May 1917

Died of wounds aged 35
Commemorated on the Menin Gate Panel 20
He was born at Addington in Kent on the 26th of January 1882 the son of the Reverend James Newton Heale, Vicar of Harbledown, and Isabella Margaret (nee Wingfield-Stratford) of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst.

He was educated at the Junior King's School from September 1891 and at the King’s School Canterbury to July 1898 after which he went to Wye Agricultural College in 1899 on a County Council Exhibition.

He was keen to take part in the South African War and he enlisted as Private 13393 in the 68th (Paget's Horse) Company, 19th Battalion Imperial Yeomanry at 8 Albany Court, London on the 15th of March 1900. At a medical examination, which was held on the same day, it was recorded that he was five feet four and a quarter inches tall and that he had a fair complexion, grey eyes and brown hair. Being too young, he served as a bugler. He embarked for service in South Africa the following day and returned to England on the 17th of June 1901 where he was discharged on demobilisation at London on the 24th of June 1901. He saw action in the Cape Colony and in the Transvaal.

On the 8th of February 1902 he was commissioned as a Lieutenant in the newly formed 38th Battalion Imperial Yeomanry but the war ended and he resigned his commission on the 16th of December 1902. At the end of the war he took a job as a school master in Johannesburg, remaining there until 1906 when he went to Jamaica, living at Westmoreland. While in Jamaica he served as a Captain in the Jamaica Armed Scouts.

On the outbreak of war he returned to the UK and applied for a commission on the 4th of May 1915. He was commissioned as a temporary Lieutenant in the 15th Battalion Northumberland Fusiliers on the 25th of May 1915. He transferred to the 10th (service) Battalion Duke of Wellington’s Own (West Riding) Regiment with the rank of Lieutenant on the 15th of June 1915 and landed in France with his battalion at Le Havre on the 26th of August 1915.

On the 6th of March 1916 the battalion marched to the Bois do Bouvigny and relieved the 9th Battalion Yorkshire Regiment in the line near the ruined village of Ablain. The trenches were in very poor condition, being little more than a string of shell holes. It was snowing and the positions were under heavy fire. The war diary records the following:- 9th of March 1916: "More snow. During the day enemy continually bombarded us with trench mortars, aerial torpedoes and shells of every calibre. The centre section of the trenches, manned by 54 men and one officer of C company suffered considerably, one killed and 18 wounded. Early in the day the medical officer (Lieutenant John Wilson) was killed whilst in performance of his duty (dressing the wounded). The under mentioned officer, NCO, and man were awarded the Military Cross and Distinguished Conduct Medal respectively for their gallantry and good bearing whilst in action under severe conditions: Lieutenant G.R.C Heale, Sergeant K Earnhaw, Private J. Hawkridge." The battalion was relieved the following evening.

The award of the Military Cross appeared in the London Gazette of the 14th of April 1916. The citation reads:-

“For conspicuous gallantry. During a continuous and very heavy bombardment by the enemy he personally attended to the wounds of 15 men, and inspired his men generally by his cool bravery”

He was wounded, in June 1916 and was promoted to temporary Captain on the 6th of July 1916. He was evacuated from the front on the 16th of August 1916 and embarked for England at Boulogne on the 20th of August, landing at Dover later the same day.

A Medical Board sat at the Kitchener Hospital at Brighton to report on his condition: -

"About the beginning of August he developed boils on the back of the neck which improved under treatment but relapsed on 14th August and formed one large suppurating sore in the nature of a carbuncle. He was admitted to this hospital on the 20th August with an open suppurating sore which has now mostly healed but there is a great deal of thickening and stiffness of the neck."

In November 1916 he was considered to be permanently unfit and was asked to resign his commission and he relinquished his commission on the grounds of ill health on the 7th of December 1916. On the 3rd of January 1917 he wrote to the War Office asking to have his commission restored as his health had improved. He attended a Medical Board at Room 358 at the War Office on the 25th of January which declared that: - "He has recovered and is fit to be re-commissioned." He was ordered to report to the 3rd (Reserve) Battalion of his regiment at South Shields without delay. He was officially reinstated in his rank on the 1st of February 1917. On his return to France he was attached to the 2nd Battalion and was given command of No 2 Company.

On the 1st of May 1917 the 2nd Battalion returned to attack the Chemical Works near Fampoux, a task which two Divisions had failed to achieve during the previous three weeks. The battalion had attacked there on the 9th of April and they too had failed to take the position. On the 3rd of May they attacked again to the south of a railway with a final objective some two miles past the factory buildings. They advanced 2,000 yards in their attack and reached their second objective, the “Blue Line”. Here they were swept with machine gun fire and lost all the officers who had survived the initial rush. The survivors fell back to a position known as the “Black Line”, some 1,000 yards in front of the trenches they had left that morning. The remaining men numbered around thirty under Company Sergeant Major Barnborough and with another seventy men from other units they dug in. George Heale was reported as wounded and missing during this action and is assumed to have died of his wounds on the field.

His father received the following telegram dated the 9th of May 1917: -

"Regret to inform you Capt. G.R.C. Heale West Riding Regt. is reported wounded and missing May third. Further news sent immediately on receipt."

A letter dated the 19th of May 1917 from 2nd Lieutenant Stanley Ainscow Belshaw, 2nd Battalion Duke of Wellington’s (West Riding) Regiment, to his mother written at the Offizierfangenenlager, at Karlsruhe in Germany confirmed George Heale's death: -

"We .... had to simply lie in shell holes and make what resistance we could against their machine guns and snipers, being half buried about every ten minutes by shells. Finally after about four or five hours I only had three men left with me and one of those was badly wounded and bleeding horribly, also we had no more Lewis gun ammunition and to have fought on would have only meant certain death for the rest of us and no gain by it as we could not get into touch with the others. Quite truthfully it took me a long time to consent to our giving up; what we had gone through deserved better things but finally no other course was open as they came up close to us. True we surrendered but I have a perfectly clear conscience about it, every man of mine that I saw behaved and fought like the true Englishmen he was. There are four of us of the 2nd Bn. here and I am so glad that old Larcombe is here too; poor fellow he was wounded in six places but he is walking about now in bandages. Two of our Captains - Heale and Cunningham who will have been reported missing both died from wounds, the former had his leg practically blown off and bled to death, the latter was shot through the stomach."

He was officially declared as having been killed in August 1917. He was twice mentioned in despatches, one in Sir Douglas Haig's despatches of the 30th of April 1916.

He is commemorated on the Wye College Memorial Plaque and on the memorial at All Soul’s Church at Twickenham, Middlesex. He is also remembered on the memorial at St Mary the Virgin Church at Nettlestead in Kent.

His brother, Lieutenant Colonel Ernest Newton Heale 121st Indian Pioneers attached to the 14th (Service) Battalion Northumberland Fusiliers (Pioneers), died on the 12th of June 1916.

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