George Robert Batson

Story:
George Robert Batson was born in 1883 in Trent, Dorset, and baptised there on 1st April, 1883. He was the son of Charles Batson, a Labourer, and his second wife, Jane Batson (née Sanders). George had joined the Dorsetshire Regiment during 1901 but had been discharged prior to 1909 and was living in Bristol Road, Sherborne, Dorset, where he married Flora Ellen Smith (nee England), (a widow with one child), on 30th May, 1909. At the time of the 1911 Census they were living at Warnford, Bishops Waltham, Hampshire, along with the step-daughter, where he was working as a cowman. There were two children of the marriage - one boy and one girl. The family were living at Sedgehill, Wiltshire, when he re-enlisted in Shaftesbury, Dorset, and joined the 6th Battalion of the Dorsetshire Regiment (Service No. 14561). He served in the Balkans from 3 Dec 1915 and later in France & Flanders and, at the time he was presumed killed in action on 16th August 1917, held the rank of Sergeant. He was awarded the Victory and British War Medals as well as the 1915 Star. His name appears on the Tyne Cot Memorial in West Flanders, Belgium (Panel 92) and he is also remembered on the Memorial Plaque in St. Catherine's Church, Sedgehill.

Flora re-married John Walter Parham on 21 Nov 1917 and lived at Westcombe, Evercreech, Somerset. The 1939 Register shows the couple living at 105 High Street, Pewsey, Wiltshire. Flora herself, having remarried, was not awarded a widow's pension but she received a weekly allowance of 12s.6d. (62p.) per week for her three children.