Lance Corporal William Taylor

Lance Corporal William Taylor, 1st/7th ( Territorial ) Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers. He was killed in action in France , aged 31, on the 15th September 1916 during the Battle of the Somme. He was the son of Margaret Taylor of Rock, Alnwick and the late William Taylor of Thornington, Mindrum, Northumberland and the husband of Mrs Taylor of Berrington, Beal. He is commemorated on the Thiepval memorial, Thiepval, Somme, France. Before enlisting in June 1915 he had been employed as a ploughman with Mr G. Scott of Chesters, Belford. ) ( His brother George, also in the 1st/7th N.F. was killed in the same action on the same day ). They fell in the attack at ” Sunken Road” near the infamous High Wood where casualties were very heavy due to the failure of the attacks by the flanking battalions. On the 15th/16th September 4 Officers and 40 Other Ranks were killed and 7 Officers and 219 Other Ranks were wounded. In addition 74 Other Ranks were posted missing. The photographs show troops on the Somme and the colour image shows a peaceful Somme landscape today. After the War an impressive Memorial was raised to the 5oth ( Northumbrian ) Division of which the Battalion was part. It was erected near the village of Weiltje in the Ypres Salient where on the 26th April 1915 the Division had fought its first action of the War only days after landing on the Continent.