PRIVATE 92122 THOMAS NOEL WITTING, 19TH BATTALION DURHAM LIGHT INFANTRY (2ND DURHAM PALS). KILLED IN ACTION 14TH OCTOBER 1918 AGED 24 YEARS

PRIVATE 92122 THOMAS NOEL WITTING, 19TH BATTALION DURHAM LIGHT INFANTRY (2ND DURHAM PALS). KILLED IN ACTION 14TH OCTOBER 1918 AGED 24 YEARS

It was on the 6th October 1918 that Noel Witting arrived in France as a newly trained private in the British Army. Just eight days later he lay dead in a Belgian field to the east of Ypres. To his parents, Charles and Emily, back in Ilkley, the death of their youngest son would have been a grievous blow made all the worse as their youngest son, Stanley, had been killed in France just seven months earlier.

Noel, was born on Christmas Eve 1893 in the Potternewton area of Leeds. His father was an agent and commercial traveller for a woollen mill and would have spent much of his time away from home. In the early part of the century Charles had moved his family to Scarborough where both his sons attended the local Grammar School. In April 1910 Noel joined the National and Provincial Bank as was sent as a trainee to a branch of the bank in Newcastle upon Tyne where he remained for three years. Posts at Norwich and Crickhowell followed before he eventually returned to the West Riding to work in a branch in Leeds. By now his parents had moved into Ilkley living at ‘Shenley’ on Westville Road which allowed him to live at home and commute daily into Leeds. (RBS Remembers)

It was in 1916 that Noel first enlisted into the army but it appears that he was sent home to wait for his call up. It was not until April 1918, just a month after his younger brother’s death, that he went to Halifax to enlist into the West Riding Regiment and to begin his training.

Just six months after enlisting, in early October Noel found himself in a base depot in France. However, instead of being assigned to a battalion of the West Riding Regiment he was posted to the 19th Durham Light Infantry who were in the front line to the east of Ypres. The Durhams had been heavily involved in fighting during the summer and early autumn and in urgent need of reinforcements as they prepared for a new offensive intended to capture the Belgian town of Courtrai. Noel was only with his new battalion when at 5.30am it advanced from its position near to the village of Becelaere behind a creeping barrage towards the enemy lines. Despite of thick fog the advance initially went well, but increasingly accurate German machine gun fire took its toll on the Durham’s who began to take casualties including Noel who was killed.

Today Private Thomas Noel Witting lies in Dadizeele New British Cemetery. He is commemorated on the roll of honour at Christchurch on The Grove, where his family worshipped, and remembered with pride on the war memorial in Ilkley

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