Frederick Harry Bennett

Story:
Frederick Harry Bennett was born in Donhead St. Mary, Wiltshire, in 1889, the son of Thomas Bennett and Ann (Annie) Bennett (née Witt).  He lived his early life with his family at Donhead St. Mary, Wiltshire, and Ashcombe, Berwick St. John, Wiltshire.   He married Agnes Marjorie Ingram in the Andover Registration District, Hampshire, in 1910.  He enlisted with the Somerset Light Infantry as a Private (Service No. 36457).  He was transferred to the Devonshire Regiment (Service No. 76119) and served in France and Flanders where it is understood he was a sniper.  After his discharge he was awarded the British War Medal.  (There are no surviving military records in this case.)  The 1921 Census shows him living at Keepers Cottage, Waldron, Sussex, working as a Gamekeeper but by the time of the 1939 Register he had moved to 1 Vicarage Road, Wallingford, Berkshire.  He took up a position of Gamekeeper at Possingworth Park, Sussex, where he was highly thought of.  His death in 1968 was registered in the Eastbourne, Sussex, Registration District and buried at All Saints Church, Waldron, East Sussex.  The tragedy is that he was one of five brothers of whom four, Bertie Harold, Walter Sam, Thomas William and Reginald George, were all killed in the conflict.