JAMES Edgar William

Edgar James was born in Bromsgrove in c1896.  His parents were Oliver and Fanny James and they lived in Stourbridge Road.  Oliver was a springmaker with a railway company.  Edgar in 1911 was 14 and worked in a clothing factory.  His elder sister, Elsie Mary, worked at home as a dressmaker.

Edgar enlisted in the army on 18th May 1914 at Bromsgrove.  He was promoted to Acting Lance Corporal on 28th August 1915, becoming a Lance Corporal on 24th May 1916 when he was posted to France.  Edgar was killed in action aged 20 on 5th August 1916 on the Western Front.

Bromsgrove, Droitwich and Redditch Messenger, 5th August 1916:
Mrs James, widow of the late Mr Oliver James, Stourbridge Road, Bromsgrove, has received a letter stating that her only son, Lance Corporal Edgar James, Worcestershire Territorials, has been killed.  It appears that death resulted from the bursting of a shell on the dug-out in which he was on duty with another signaller, who was also killed.  Lance Corporal James had been at the front a few months.  He was 19 years of age and was in the territorials when war was declared.  At that time he was engaged at the Midland Railway Works, Bromsgrove.  He was a member of the Congregational Church Choir.

The following information has been researched and transcribed by Sandra Taylor:
E.W. James, Lance Corporal, Worcestershire Regiment was employed by the Midland Railway as a Greaser in the Carriage and Wagon Department at Bromsgrove Station. These details are recorded in the company’s memorial book.

Source: In Remembrance of the Brave Men of the Midland Railway who Gave their Lives in the Great War 1914-1919.  Published by the company to coincide with the unveiling of the Midland Railway War Memorial at Derby on Thursday 15th December 1921 at 11.45am.

Railway archives record E.W. James as working for the Midland Railway as a Lifter’s Boy prior to his enlistment in the army.

A photograph of Lance Corporal E. James of Bromsgrove can be found in Berrow’s Worcester Journal Supplement, Saturday 26th August 1916, available at Worcestershire Archives.