PERONNE COMMUNAL CEMETERY EXTENSION
Peronne
Somme
France
General Directions: From Bapaume take the N17 to Peronne. On entering Peronne, turn right towards the hospital. On reaching the hospital, which will be on the right, take the small road opposite and the communal cemetery is at the end of this road on the left. The extension is on the south-west side of the cemetery.
Peronne was taken by the German on 24 September 1914. On 18 March 1917, the 40th and 48th Divisions captured the town, but it was recovered by the Germans on the 23rd March 1918. It changed hands for the last time on 1 September 1918, when it was taken by the 2nd Australian Division The cemetery extension was begun by the 48th (South Midland) Division in March 1917, used by the Germans in 1918, and resumed by Australian units in September 1918. At the Armistice it contained 177 graves, now in Plots I and II. It was then enlarged when graves were brought in from the battlefields north and east of Peronne and from other small cemeteries in the area.
Victoria Cross: Corporal Alexander Henry Buckley, VC, 54th Bn. Australian Infantry. Killed in action 01/09/1918. Plot II. C. 32.
Shot at Dawn: Private W. Robinson, 1st Bn. Sherwood Foresters (Notts and Derby Regiment), executed for desertion 10/04/1917, plot 3. B. 22.
Casualty Details: UK 1065, Canada 1, Australia 517, South Africa 9, Germany 97, Total Burials: 1689
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37232 Lance Corporal Wilfrid Holden 12th (West Somerset Yeomanry) Bn. Somerset Light Infantry. 02/09/1918, aged 27. Son of Edward and Catherine Holden, of "Gainsborough," Ribbleton Avenue, Preston. Plot V. B. 16 Picture courtesy of John Garlington |
1169 Corporal Clarence William Lambley 34th Bn. Australian Infantry Force. 31/08/1918, aged 29. Plot V. P. 2. Son of William and Maria Jane Lambley. Born in Australia, native of Wards River, New South Wales. Picture courtesy of Vicki Lambley great niece of Clarence Lambley |
Second Lieutenant Thomas Edward Smith 8th Bn. London Regiment (Post Office Rifles) Killed in action 05/09/1918, aged 21. Son of William Henry and Judith Ellen Smith, of 290, Lizzie St., Winnipeg, Manitoba. Plot III. I. 36.
Picture courtesy of Ken Kennedy, of Winnipeg, Canada, nephew of this soldier. |
6421 Private Charles Cephas Coley 25th Bn. Australian Infantry, A. I. F. 02/09/1918, aged 19. Plot III. E. 26 Son of Mrs. Lucy Coley, of Brisbane St., Ipswich Rd., South Brisbane, Queensland Born at Roma, Queensland.
"Remembered" by Christine Stone
Picture courtesy of Christine Stone |
S/20121 Private
John Keith
14th Bn. Black Watch
(Fife and Forfar Yeomanry)
02/09/1918, aged 22.
Plot B. III. 33
John Wallace Keith b. 5/6/1896 in Ladybank, Fife, Scotland was the son of Robert and Jane Wallace Keith. John was unmarried and working in the ticket office of Kirkcaldy Railway Station at the time he enlisted in the Fife & Forfar Yeomanry (the Black Watch). His first posting was to Egypt, but dysentery caused him to be shipped home to recover. He returned to the war in France and was killed in an action in the fields around the village of Moislain, Somme on 2/9/1918. Those killed in the same action were buried in Moislains but at the end of the war re-interred at the Peronne Communal Cemetery Extension.
John's name is shown on war memorials in Ladybank and Giffardtown, Fife and on the Railworkers National Memorial inside Edinburghs Waverley Station. The Books of Remembrance at Edinburgh Castle show 'no known grave' but in 2001, thanks to the Commonwealth War Grave website, his burial site at Peronne was finally found. The next Spring our family, including his nephew Robert, travelled to France to honour him, placing a Saltire and British Legion cross on the grave.
The cemetery at Peronne is quiet and beautifully maintained - more a tranquil garden than an 'foreign field'.
Picture and text courtesy of A Wade.
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