DRIVER 44463 WILLIAM THROUP TOPHAM, ROYAL ENGINEERS.


DRIVER 44463 WILLIAM THROUP TOPHAM, ROYAL ENGINEERS. DIED OF WOUNDS 23rd. APRIL 1917


Born in Addingham in 1885 William Topham was the second surviving son of Alfred and Grace Topham. By 1901 the family had moved to Ilkley where they took up residence first on Wilmot Road and then at 1 Bridge Lane a shop on the corner with Church Street, where Alfred traded as a fish merchant. William meanwhile was employed by the well known Ilkley grocer Ellis Beanland of The Grove as a groom and carter.

William was one of the town’s earliest recruits at the beginning of the war and the Ilkley Gazette reported that he was already at a training camp on September 4th 1914. His skills as a groom in an army still almost totally reliant on horse drawn transport would earmark him as suitable material as a wagon driver.  Assigned to the Royal Artillery, William was posted to the signals section of the 9th (Scottish) Division who disembarked in France on 12th May 1915.

The divisional signals section was responsible for maintaining telephone communications between the front line and the divisional headquarters a few miles behind the trenches. As a wagon driver, William would have driven a large cart pulled by a team of horses whose control would have required considerable skill. Although, the role rarely involved going into the front line, William would at times have been close to the fighting.

In April 1917, the 9th Division where heavily involved in the Spring Offensive around the French town of Arras. On the 23rd of the month William and his unit were stationed near to the village of Etrun, just behind the front line, when he was badly wounded probably by a stray German shell. Evacuated to the 19th Casualty Clearing Station William succumbed to his wounds later that same day.

Today Driver William Throup Topham lies in the British Military Cemetery at Duisan and is remembered on the war memorials in Addingham and Ilkley.

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