Lieutenant Edgar Stiles

Lieutenant Edgar Watson Stiles M.I.D., 1st7th ( Territorial ) Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers. He died in France on 13th April 1918, aged 36, of wounds received during the German Spring Offensive on the River Lys. He had been born in Doncaster and was the son of Matthew and Alice Stiles of 10 Avenue Road, Berwick and is buried in Lapugnoy Military Cemetery., Pas de Calais, France.  He had been educated at st Cuthbert’s College, Worksop and London University from where he graduated in 1900. He had practised as a Solicitor with T. C. Smith in Berwick before going on to his own Practice. At the beginning of the War he was Sheriff of Berwick.  He was commissioned in 1915 and spent most of his time at the front with a Trench Mortar Battery. The photographs show Allied troops in rather makeshift defences preparing to resist the advancing Germans. The colour photograph shows the impressive Memorial raised to commemorate the 50th ( Northumbrian ) Division of which the Battalion was part until February 1918 when it was transferred to the 42nd ( East Lancashire ) Division as the Pioneer Battalion. It was erected near the village of Weiltje in the Ypres Salient where nearby at St. Julien the Division had fought its first action of the War only days after landing on the Continent. The photos show Allied troops in defensive positions.