Memorial to Henry (Harry) John Collings, High Wycombe Cemetery
Henry (Harry) John Collings 1884 - 1917
Hello, my name is Henry John Collins but most people know me as Harry. I am the son of John and Annie Elizabeth Collings, nee White. My parents married in the Wycombe district in 1872 although my father had been born in Aylesbury and my mother in Great Marlow. I was born in 1884 and was baptised at All Saints Parish Church on the 4th January the following year. I had 8 siblings, 5 sisters and 3 brothers, but one of my older sisters, Kate Matilda, died three years after my birth, in 1887, when she was 12 years old so sadly my memories of her are minimal. My parents went on to have another daughter who they also called Kate.
We originally lived at Laura Place, then Remington Street and by 1911 we were living at 66 Bridge Street, High Wycombe in a 3 roomed home. My parents had been married for thirty nine years by that time and most of my siblings had flown the nest which was just as well as the house was really quite small. Just my parents, myself and my sisters Kate Maud aged 20 and Ethel Dora aged 18 were living there. Both my father and I were chairmakers. At the time of my death my parents had moved again, to 210 Desborough Road.
When the Great War began Wycombe was to change, with many men leaving to fight the good fight and troops arriving to train on the Rye. I was no exception.Initially I was a private with the the Somerset Light Infantry, service number 24566, but then I became Private Henry John Collings, service no. G/24434 of the Queens Own (Royal West Kent Regiment) 7th Battalion. The 7th Battalion had breen formed at Maidstone on 5 September 1914 and came under the command of 55th Brigade in 18th (Eastern) Division. The Battalion then moved to Colchester in April 1915 and on to Salisbury Plain in May. On the 27th July 1915 it landed at Le Havre. Our motto was 'Invicta (Invincible), Quo Fas et Gloria Ducunt (Whither Duty and Glory Lead)'.
I was killed in action in Flanders on Friday, 12th October 1917 aged 33. I am buried at Cement House Cemetery, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium, and remembered on the High Wycombe Hospital war memorial and here on the family grave in High Wycombe Cemetery.
A war memorial to the regiment's dead of the First World War, known as the Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment Cenotaph, stands in Brenchley Gardens in Maidstone. Designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, who was responsible for the Cenotaph in London, the memorial is a cenotaph almost identical to that on Whitehall but reduced to two-thirds scale and lacking adorning flags. It was unveiled on 30 July 1921 by Major General Sir Edmund Leach, colonel of the regiment, and dedicated by the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Researched by Margaret Anderton, Flackwell Local Area History Group and Sally Scagell, Lost the Plot
