Alfred Ethelred Lancaster
Alfred Lancaster was born in Shenley in 1896, the eldest son of William Lancaster, Metropolitan Police Constable and his wife Ellen. After retirement in 1916 William became Manager of the Rose and Crown, then a Home Counties Public House Trust Hotel.
Alfred initially worked in a photographic materials factory but then worked as a clerk for the Public House Trust in Radlett.
Alfred joined up on 23rd November 1915 at Hounslow, initially into the
Royal Fusiliers. He was posted to France in March the following year and on the 4th June was wounded by shrapnel in the left arm. He was treated, initially in the Canadian General Hospital, Boulogne and returned to France in August 1916. He was almost immediately transferred to the 12th Battalion, Middlesex Regiment.
He was posted as ‘missing’ on the 3rd May 1917. His death was confirmed in November in a letter received by his mother from the British Red Cross.
‘We have received an account of your missing son from a man who knew him well and who apparently has written to you already, Pte. F. Buchan of the same company and who is in the Cornelia Hospital, Poole, Dorset.
I am giving you his account in his own words. He says:
I saw Lancaster killed by a shell within Fritz’s second line. We reached that and were driven back afterwards. He was about 18 years of age, nice looking and dark. We were together in the 12th Fusiliers and transferred together to the Middlesex Regt.
Buchan describes your son’s death as instantaneous, which I hope will be a comfort to you in the thought that it was free from suffering. We will send you any further report we may receive.’
Alfred had a brother, Clarence, in the Royal West Surrey Regiment also serving in France
Alfred is also named on the Shenley War Memorial
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Photograph of Alfred Lancaster courtesy of Ms. R. Wilkinson
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