LIVES could be cut dramatically short on the Western Front, as illustrated graphically this week by the fate of Egbert Dolphin.
Born in Feckenham to David and Mary Ann Dolphin in 1878, he was one of several children in the family. His brother John and his wife Alice and their children set sail for Canada in 1905 arriving in Quebec in 1906 where John died of heart failure within days of landing.
We next hear of an ‘Agbert’ Dolphin, brother in law, living with Alice and the children in the 1911 Canadian census in Elgin, Ontario.
On February 28, 1916 Egbert enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, as a private in the 38th Battalion of the Canadian Infantry (Eastern Ontario Regiment).
Given the time it would take to undergo training, then cross the Atlantic, Egbert couldn’t have seen much of the war when, on November 17, his unit was moved into the front line on the Somme.
Known as the Battle of the Ancre, it had started on November 13 and was to be the final attack of the Somme campaign.
At 6.10am on November 18, the last day of the entire Somme campaign, the 38th, part of the Canadian 4th Division, went ‘over the top’ for the first time in an attack on the German held ‘Desire’ Trench and the village of Grandcourt.
They achieved all their objectives, but at a terrible cost, the battalion suffering some 500 casualties, among whom was Egbert.
He is remembered on the war memorial at St John the Baptist Church, Feckenham.
With thanks to Remembering Redditch’s Fallen Heroes and Wikipedia’s History of the 38th Battalion Canadian Expeditionary Force.
