White Hart Street beyond Guildhall (picture from SWOP website)
Grave of Rupert Harris in High Wycombe Cemetery
Rupert Harris 1881 - 1918
My name is Rupert Harris and I was born in 1881 in High Wycombe. My parents were John and Mary Ann nee Newell and they were married in High Wycombe on 12th October 1879. By 1891 we were living at King’s Street Yard, High Wycombe and my father was working in the furniture industry as a polisher. By 1901 we were living at 8, Chapel Place and I had become a cabinet/chair maker like my father. I had several younger sisters by this time, Kate, Marina, Bertha, Lily, and Edith.
By 1911 we were living at 12, Laura Place, White Hart Street, High Wycombe and I was working as a polisher and still living at home with my parents and three of my sisters Bertha, Lily and Edith. But in 1914 war was declared and our lives were to change.
I enlisted in High Wycombe and joined the 5th Bedfordshire Regiment also known as the “yellow devils”. Unfortunately my war records have not survived. However, I can tell you that the 5th Battalion earned their nickname when an officer saw the metal flashes on their caps glinting yellow in the sun. They were a Territorial Battalion and in January 1915 were designated as the 1/5th Battalion. They served in Gallipoli and endured some of the worst engagements in that Theatre of War. They were part of the 162nd (East Midland) Brigade, 54th (East Anglian) Division which were heavily involved in guarding the Suez canal and after marching to Gaza they took part in all the action there plus the advance to Palestine.
Evidently I was wounded, or taken ill, and sent back to Blighty as records show that my death on the 3rd January 1918 was registered in the Southwell District of Nottinghamshire, but you would need my death certificate to prove the actual place and cause of my death.
I may have been admitted to Burgage Manor which was requisitioned as a hospital during WW1. Many of the patients were sent here from acute hospitals in Leicester and Lincoln. (The Manor was a former home of Lord Byron from 1803-1808).
My mother’s address at the time of my death was 12, Dovecot, Oxford Road, High Wycombe. So my body was sent back to High Wycombe for burial in the cemetery here.
The inscription on my grave reads: “ THOUGH LOST TO SIGHT TO MEMORY DEAR”.
Researched by Ruth Bowler, Flackwell Local Area History Group
