War with Germany was declared on 4th August 1914. Sometime after this, George Dodsworth enlisted in the army at Boroughbridge [[1]]. Whether he volunteered or was conscripted is not known, and neither is the date on which he joined the army [[2]]. George joined the 5th Battalion, West Yorkshire Regiment (Prince of Wales’s Own) as Private No. 3354. It is not possible to find out from a man’s army number whether he volunteered or was conscripted.
The Prince of Wales’s Own Regiment of Yorkshire hold no records of individual soldiers. They did, however, provide a very comprehensive account of the movements of the 5th Battalion West Yorkshire Regiment during the war. From this it seems likely that George fought in France, but extensive research has yielded not one single clue as to his war service.
Research at the Imperial War Museum gave pointers to several lines of enquiry as to where George saw action in the war, all of which proved fruitless.
A letter of enquiry to the Ministry of Defence Army Personnel Centre in Glasgow was re-routed to the Ministry of Defence Records Office at Hayes. They in turn advised that all surviving service records of soldiers who fought in the First World War had been transferred to the National Archives at Kew - formerly known as the Public Records Office. Unfortunately, the operative word here is ‘surviving’ as 70% of these records which were originally kept at the Ministry of Defence in London were destroyed in the Blitz of the Second World War. Some burnt documents survive and are in the process of being restored where possible.
Searches of the surviving documents at the National Archives as detailed below yielded nothing.
Archive WO 364 is a collection of some 750,000 individual records of service , primarily of men who were discharged as a result of sickness contracted or wounds received during the war.
Archive WO 363 is a collection of approximately 2,000,000 individual records of service and include records of men who completed their service as well as those who were killed, died of wounds, or were executed.
No service records were found to exist for George Dodsworth.
Enquiries to the Ministry of Defence Army Medal Office at Droitwich Spa brought the response that after the war all campaign awards were automatically issued by Registered Post to the medal earner, or if deceased, to the next of kin. These awards were then entered on the Medal Rolls which were not compiled until the issue of the medals had been completed. The Medal Rolls are now held in the National Archive but as with the Service Records these are incomplete, as much data was destroyed during the Blitz of the Second World War.
A search of the Medal Roll showed that no entry was present for George Dodsworth. As medals were not issued until after the war and George died in 1917 any medals for which he was eligible would have been issued to his widow.
Two local newspapers reported on the area around Aldborough, The Boroughbridge Observer and The Knaresborough Post + Boroughbridge Herald. These contained reports of those killed or wounded in action submitted by the families of those affected and quite often also showed a photograph of the man concerned. The Newspaper Library at Colindale has the original copies of these newspapers in its archives. However, a thorough search of the years 1914 to 1919 [[3]] brought no mention of George Dodsworth as a casualty.
Many postcards sent by soldiers fighting in the First World War to their families at home are still in existence. However, a search of the archive of these postcards found none sent by George Dodsworth.
The Archive of the National Army Museum in London is held at York. It holds records of war casualties which contain lists of the casualty’s personal effects, next of kin and monies owed.
Enquiries to the museum showed that a record exists [[4]] showing that two payments were made in 1919 to George Dodsworth’s widow Rebecca, by then Mrs. Holliday. These are perhaps backdated army pay ?
At the outbreak of the First World War there was a great demand for unskilled labour in many kinds of work such as railways, roads, farming, docks, forestry and quarries. However, men fit to fight could not be spared from the battle front. The introduction of the Military Service Acts of 1916 made provision for a category of men who although not suitable for service in the trenches, were capable of performing labour duties. This included down-graded fighting men, volunteers beyond the age set for combatant service, and men suffering from some slight physical disability which prevented service in the line. The first labour units were created in February 1916. However, it was not until February 1917 that a Labour Directorate was established to undertake the administration and distribution of the labour units in accordance with the directions of the General Staff. The various service and infantry labour units were then brought together to form the Labour Corps
By 1917, George had been transferred from the 5th Battalion West Yorkshire Regiment to the No. 409 Agricultural Corps as Private No. 239234 and was working on Mr. Slator’s [[5]] farm at Midville in Lincolnshire. How long George worked there is not known, but he would have been familiar with farm work as at one time he had been an agricultural labourer [[6]]. The reason or date of his transfer is not known, but it seems likely that he had been wounded in action and was transferred when recovered from his injuries.
The area around Midville is known as East Fen. At the beginning of the ninteenth century the condition of the East Fen, which lies on a tract of peat, was particularly bad. In winter it was a mass of lakes bordered by a thick crop of reeds, and even in dry summers its ‘deeps’ were covered on an average by about two feet of water. In 1799, reports were commissioned on the possibilities of draining the area, and two reports were published in April and September of 1800. An Act was obtained in 1801 such that the waters of the East Fen were drained by a new cut called Hobhole Drain. The drain opened in 1806 on the completion of Hobhole Sluice. In 1812 the land having been drained, seven new townships were created and one of these was Midville.
Midville is a small and peaceful hamlet isolated in the Lincolnshire Fens. In 1917 its population was around 200 people. Pleasant on a fine spring day but bleak in the winter months. It is dominated by Hobhole Drain which begins 3 miles north of Midville and runs north-to-south for 14 miles before its confluence with The Haven which flows out into The Wash, south-east of Boston.
Midville Road runs alongside Hobhole Drain which is joined by Barlode Drain and Bell Water Drain at Bell Water Bridge where the old bridge stands near to a more recent one. The Duke of Wellington Inn in Station Road stands on the eastern bank of Hobhole Drain opposite Bell Water Bridge on the western bank. Today, the inn is part of a caravan park and camping site, but nevertheless still functions as an inn. Moving southwards there are Station Cottages, named for the railway [[7]] which used to run through Midville, now dismantled. A mile southwards from Bell Water Bridge and the inn is St Peter’s Church. This small red-brick church was built in 1819-20 and lies at the crossroads where Hobhole Drain crosses Fodder Dyke. It is a quiet and peaceful place.
[1] Data from Commonwealth War Graves Commission citation.
[2] Note that George was on the 1915 electoral register. This may indicate that he had not enlisted in the army when the electoral register for 1915 was compiled.
[3] Although George died in 1917, the possibility of his name being present in lists of men published after the war was investigated.
[4] Effects Register Entry : First World War : Record No. 347/593855 : DODSWORTH George
30/10/1919 Authorised to Rebecca Holliday (Widow) 7£ 7s 10d
12/12/1919 Authorised to Rebecca Holliday (Widow) 9£ 10s 0d
[5] Richard Johnson Slator (1842 – 1930) – farmer and horse dealer. His entry on the 1918-19 electoral register gives only that his farm was on Fodderdyke. The current O.S. map of the area shows quite a number of farms around Midville and Fodderdyke, but despite research in trade directories of the time and at the Land Registry it has not been possible to find out which farm he owned.
[6] Tractors did not become commonplace until after the First World War. Most tasks were done manually or with the assistance of horse drawn transport.
[7] Pre-1913 travel between Lincoln and the seaside towns of east coast Lincolnshire was difficult without travelling via Boston. In 1911 a new double-track railway line was commissioned to run between Coningsby and Midville. It opened in 1913 and was named the ‘New Line’. During 1914 one track was taken up and shipped to France, but was reinstalled after the war. At Midville Station there was a small station building adjacent to Railway Cottages and a signal box. There was a building with a shelter on both platforms. The station master had his own house. The line functioned until the 1960s and has since been dismantled.
