Arthur Jukes (1891-1915)

Post date: Aug 31, 2015 5:0:49 PM

Arthur was born in 1891 or '92 in Egerton, Kent to Harry and Ellen Jukes who by the time of the 1901 census were living in The Street, Mereworth but by 1911 they had moved to a 3 room cottage in Old Road, Wateringbury where Harry was recorded as a House painter and Arthur as a butcher. Arthur had attended Wateringbury school and was the second of 4 children.

We do not know the date he joined the 1st Battalion of the Coldstream Guards but it is likely that it was after the outbreak of war as he did not go to France until 22 January 1915, whereas his battalion, as part of the B.E.F. had gone on the outbreak of war and participated in the The Battle of Mons and the subsequent retreat, The Battle of the Marne, The Battle of the Aisne, First Battle of Ypres. He was a private, service number 11799 and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission record his date of death as 28th September 1915 (Loos Memorial panel 7 and 8), but the August 1916 parish magazine (nearly a year later) states: We also heard that Arthur Jukes' parents had received official notice that the War Office had given up all hope of his having survived the battle of Loos.

His battalion's (part of the 2nd Guards brigade , Guards Division) handwritten war diary (Army form c. 2118) for the 28th September transcribes as follows:

Place: trenches round wood & chalk pit on the LENS-LABASSEE Road¹ .

Summary of events: Great difficulty in obtaining tools & stores owing to there being two sides of open ground with barbed wire & ??? trenches in between us & VERMELLES. Tremendous shellfire into the wood & chalk pit where the Bⁿ HQ was situated.

At 3.45 p.m. ordered to attack ???14 ?? and establish line on ?railway? with 2 companies. No 1 & no 2 cos advanced with their left on the LENS-LABASSEE Road. They were met almost before they got out of the trenches by a terrific machine gun fire which enfiladed them from 3 sides (chiefly from BOIS VICTOR HUGO). They were absolutely mown down. 2 officers L^t. Riley (OC no 2 Co) & 2nd L^t Style (OC no 1 Co) with 8 men reached the objective which they found not held by enemy but enfiladed by yet another machine gun.

L^t. Riley & two men got back. The men behaved simply splendidly as not only were they subject to this enormous enfilade machine gun fire but also to a short terrific bombardment by 8 inch shells [rest indecipherable]

Casualties: 9 officers and 220 other ranks.

He is commemorated (along with 26 thousand others) on panels 7 and 8 of the Loos Memorial, to be found 4 miles northwest of Lens near the village of Loos-en-Gohelle on the D943 , the main Lens-Bethune road.

Notes:

1. In previous day's diary it is noted that the wood and chalk pit was a prominent salient which made them difficult to hold.