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2nd Lieutenant Gerald Morton STAMFORD
C Company, 2nd Battalion Wiltshire Regiment Date of birth: 23rd March 1894 Date of death: 15th June 1915 Killed in action aged 21 Commemorated on the Le Touret Memorial Panels 33 and 34
Gerald Morton Stamford was born "Glenmore", Hill Lane, Millbrook in Southampton on the 23rd of March 1894 the son of Harry Morton Stamford, a gentleman, and Eveleen Beatrice Laura (nee Image) Stamford of “Oakleigh”, Catherine Road, Newbury in Berkshire. He was educated at a preparatory school in Brighton and at Lancing College where he was in News House from January 1906 to April 1912. On leaving school he became a fruit farmer at Rudgwick in West Sussex. Following the outbreak of war he enlisted into the army at Brighton as Private 5683 in the 20th (Service) Battalion Royal Fusiliers (3rd Public Schools), University and Public School Corps on the 11th of September 1914. At a medical examination, which was held at Brighton College on the same day, it was recorded that he was five feet six and a half inches tall, that he weighed nine stones and one pound and that he had a fair complexion, blue eyes and light brown hair. He applied for entrance to the Royal Military College at Sandhurst on the 21st of November 1914, which he attended for a short time before being commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Wiltshire Regiment on the 17th of March 1915. He embarked for France on the 8th of April 1915. On the 14th of June 1915 the battalion paraded at 2.45pm and marched to trenches at Givenchy where they relieved the Scots Guards and the Border Regiment. Due to congestion in the trenches this was not complete until 2am the next morning. On the 15th of June C and D Companies suffered a few casualties from spasmodic shelling and at 6pm the battalion attacked the German trenches opposite. As the two assaulting companies (C&D) left their trenches they came under heavy frontal and enfilade fire from machine guns on both flanks. B Company then joined the attack in direct support of C Company and all survivors were forced to make a new firing line some 50 yards from the German front line. By this time there was only one unwounded officer from both the two leading companies. At 7.05pm A Company moved forward from Scottish Trench, where they had been waiting in reserve, and advanced to join the ranks of the men who had gone before but they too were quickly pinned down and the attack stalled. A new attack was planned for 9.15pm which was then postponed to 10pm and eventually cancelled. Instead they handed their positions over to the Bedfordshire Regiment at 3am on the 16th and retired. Casualties for the attack were 4 officers and 25 other ranks killed, 5 officers and 127 other ranks wounded and 48 other ranks missing, most of whom had died immediately in front of the German line. Half the casualties had come from C Company who had lost all their officers. His mother received the following telegram dated the 19th of June 1915: - "Deeply regret to inform you that 2nd Lieut. G.M. Stamford Wilts Regt. was killed in action June 15th. Lord Kitchener expresses his sympathy." She applied for his medals in April 1921. He is commemorated on the war memorial at Newbury and on the memorial at the Royal Military College Sandhurst.

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