Lt Col Claude Parry DSO RFA d. 20/8/18

[Will O'Brien]

As per CWGC

Name: PARRY, CLAUD FREDERICK PILKINGTON

Initials: C F P

Nationality: United Kingdom

Rank: Lieutenant Colonel

Regiment: Royal Field Artillery

Unit Text: 34th Bde.

Date of Death: 20/08/1918

Awards: DSO

Additional information: Son of the late Maj. Gen. F. W. B. Parry; husband of Dora Frances Parry, of "Kelvin", Brockhill Rd., Hythe, Kent.

Casualty Type: Commonwealth War Dead

Grave/Memorial Reference: XIX. E. 3.

Cemetery: BIENVILLERS MILITARY CEMETERY

[Will O'Brien]

& the cemetery info

Cemetery: BIENVILLERS MILITARY CEMETERY

Country: France

Locality: Pas de Calais

Location Information: Bienvillers is a large village in the department of the Pas de Calais 18 kilometres south-west of Arras. The Military Cemetery is just beyond the village on the south road leading to Souastre (D2). A CWGC signpost indicating directions to the site is situated on the village square.

Historical Information: Bienvillers Military Cemetery was begun in September 1915 by the 37th Division, carried on by other Divisions in the line until March 1917, reopened from March to September 1918, when the village was again near the front line, and completed in 1922-24 when a number of graves, mainly of 1916, were brought in from the battlefields of the Ancre. Its twenty-one plots show a remarkable alternation of original burials in regimental or divisional groups, and groups of concentrated graves. The cemetery now contains 1,605 Commonwealth burials and commemorations of the First World War. 425 of the burials are unidentified but there are special memorials to two casualties known or believed to be buried among them. The 16 Second World War burials all date from the early months of the war, before the German invasion in May 1940 forced the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force from France.

No. of Identified Casualties: 1197

[rflory]

Lieut. Col. Claud Frederick Pilkington Parry, DSO, RFA

Born on 19 Jun 1870; the son of Maj. Gen. F W P Parry, late the Cheshire Regiment, North House, Chichester, Sussex

Educated at Sherborne School from 1884 to 1886

Gentleman Cadet, Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, 4 Feb 88

2nd Lieut., RA on 14 Feb 90

Lieut, RA, 14 Feb 93

Served in India from Jan 1896 to Dec 1906 and from Nov 1908 to 1914

Captain, RFA, 3 Feb 00

Major, RFA, 20 Jul 07

Lt-Col, RFA, 18 Dec 15

Served in France from 5 Nov 15 to 20 Aug 18

OC, 136th Battery, RFA

OC, 3rd Bty, 45th Bde, 8th Div, 1914

OC, 34th Brigade, RFA

Distinguished Service Order, London Gazette, 1 January 1917

Mentioned in despatches, 22 Jun 15; 1 Jan 16, 4 Jan 17, 14 Dec 17

Wounded on 3 Aug 17

Killed in action on 20 Aug 18

Sources: Old Shirburnian Navy & Army List, 1914-1919; Sherborne Register, 1550-1937; Sherborne Register, 1550-1950; Distinguished Service Order, 1886-1923; War Services of Officers, 31 Dec 17; List of Officers of the Royal Regiment of Artillery, 1862-1914; The Eighth Division in the War, 1914-1918; History of the Second Division, 1914-1918.

Regards. Dick Flory