Royal Field Artillery, “Y” 25th Trench Mortar Battery, Service no. 63155
Son of John William Sugden and Annie Wilkinson
Killed in action, 18th January 1918, aged 25
Buried in the Royal Berkshire Military Cemetery, Hainaut, Belgium (pictured bottom left).
Story
Born in Armley on 6th January 1893, Ernest Sugden married Annie Glitherow Collinson in Kippax on 11th April 1914, and they had a son John William Sugden in December 1914, named after Ernest’s late father, who had died in Swillington in 1913. Ernest’s mother was Annie Wilkinson. After Ernest’s death in 1918, his widow Annie, whose elder sister Mary Ellen had also been widowed by the war, remarried in Kippax in 1919, but passed away herself in 1920.
Trench Mortar Battery (pictured bottom right)
Trench mortars were used in a variety of defensive and offensive roles, from the suppression of an enemy machine-gun or sniper post, to the coordinated firing of barrages. Larger mortars were sometimes used for cutting barbed wire, especially where field artillery could not be used, either because of the danger of hitting British troops or where the effect of the fire could not be observed. Experience on the Somme revealed that use of Stokes mortars in an offensive close-support role had been limited by the reluctance of some commanders to sacrifice rifle strength to provide parties required to carry the ammunition which the weapons so quickly consumed. Ernest’s “Y” company was a medium Battery.
Kippax Roll of Honour 