Royal Army Medical Corps.
Born: 2nd June 1868. Died: 1944.
Story
Dr. Stephen Infield, pictured above laying a wreath at the Kippax Memorial, was born in Lewes, East Sussex, and was the son of Henry John Infield, JP (1846-1921) and his wife Frances. Henry founded the Sussex Daily Newspaper in the year Stephen was born and within three years was employing 12 men and seven boys. In 1880 he launched The Argus, into which he merged The Sussex Daily News. In 1889 he became chairman and joint managing director of Brighton Theatre Royal Company, under whose tenure Oscar Wilde’s first four plays were brought to the theatre. His final home was at the Grand Hotel, Eastbourne, where he passed away leaving an estate worth £72,786 7s 9d, which would be the equivalent today of £2.5m.
With his father’s financial backing, Stephen studied medicine in London, where he met and married Virginia Johnson in Kensington 1894, and qualified in 1896 to be a doctor and surgeon. He also wrote two medical books: “Peculiar injury to Parotid Gland” and in 1898 “Three cases of arsenical poisoning from drinking beer”.
After practising medicine in Lewes, he moved his surgery to Bowes Park London, and then moved to Hyde, Cheshire. With three daughter and two sons, Dr. Infield came to Kippax in 1910. He established his home and surgery at Kippax House, Cross Hill, which later became the Royal Oak. He employed three servants: a house maid, a between maid, and a Coachman, Henry Thompson, pictured here outside Kippax House:
Stephen’s son-in-law was killed early in the war, and his death was reported in the Yorkshire Post on 7th October 1915 (below), alongside Rudyard Kipling’s son, John, about whom he wrote the 1915 poem ‘My son Jack’, which was the subject of a 1997 play and 2007 film of the same title:
Dr. Infield was a Captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps during the First World War, and returned to Kippax at the start of 1918 after two years’ service. He was Chairman at the meeting which presented Gunner Albert Clark with his Military Medal, and he “spoke at some length on some of the work of the army, and appealed to all to make some sacrifice for the sake of their lads and stop grousing because they could not get all they wanted.”
Dr. Infield remained living and working in Kippax into the 1930s, even donating a human skeleton for the ambulance cadets to work with, which the recruits named Evelyn. Dr. Infield then moved to Tidemark House, Fareham, Hampshire, and at the start of the Second World War, he worked as a First Aid Mobile Unit, and returned periodically to Kippax to support the War effort. He passed away on 18th January 1944 at the age of 75, and was fondly remembered in the local press. His wife Virginia passed away weeks later at the age of 71.
Kippax Roll of Honour 