BEALE STREET

 

21 Beale Street

ASTON Arthur Harry

Rank : Private
Regiment : 14th Battalion Worcestershire Regiment
Service number : 46872
Conflict : WW1
Date of death : 26th October 1917 aged 39
Buried : Nine Elms British Cemetery, Belgium, Grave VII. A. 8.
Relatives : Husband of Beatrice Harriet Aston, 21 Beale Street, Stourbridge
Memorial : Stourbridge War Memorial
Also appears on : Stourbridge St Thomas's Church
Credits : Researched by The Black Country Society.

Details:
 

Arthur Aston lived with his wife Beatrice and had a successful butcher’s business.  

He enlisted in the Worcesters in May 1917 and went to the 14th Battalion, the Pioneer Battalion of the 63rd Division.  

He joined them in July and, in October, went  to Flanders for the last stage of the Third Battle of Ypres.

Poelcapelle had been taken on 9th October but the first attempt on the Passchendaele Ridge on 12th October did not succeed.  

Haig decided to bring up the 63rd Division.  In the treacherous conditions of the Flanders battlefield the Pioneers’ task was to keep the trenches intact, to repair the duckboard routes, and to allow the flow of men, stores and ammunition to reach the front line.  

This was a near impossible task, under the almost continuous shelling and bombing by German aircraft.

The attack of 24th October was eventually successful and the Ridge was taken. However, Private Arthur Aston was among those seriously wounded and he was taken to a Casualty Clearing Station at Poperingue.  

He died of wounds on the 26th October and is buried at the nearby Nine Elms British Cemetery.