Morley

Marmaduke Robert Hood Morley

Appears as:

Born:

Parents:

Unit:

No.:

Rank:

Died:

Grave/Memorial:

Morley, Noel

1894

Noel and Jessie (née Ford)

8th Battalion, King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry

N/A

Lieutenant

1 July 1916, age 22

Blighty Valley Cemetery, Authuile Wood, Somme, Picardie, France: V. J. 22.

Biography:
Marmaduke Robert Hood Morley, known as ‘Duke’, was born in 1894 in Middlesex. He was the only son of Alfred Noel, a warehouseman, and Jessie
Maria Justice(née Ford). He had two sisters.

It is the name of his father which appears on the monument. Presumably, his father was the sponsor and, somehow, the names were transposed.

Duke was educated at West Downs School, an English independent preparatory school, in Winchester and at Winchester College to which he won a
scholarship. He also obtained a scholarship to Magdalen College Cambridge in 1913.

When the war began, Duke obtained his commission, joining The King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry. By the time he deployed to the front, in August
1915, he had gained his second star.

Marmaduke Robert Hood Morley was killed on 1 July 1916. He is buried, in grave V. J. 22, within Blighty Valley Cemetery, Authuile Wood, Somme,
France.

Blighty Valley was the name given by the Army to the lower part of the deep valley running down South-Westward through Authuile Wood to join the
river between Authuile and Aveluy; The upper part of the valley was called Nab Valley. Blighty Valley Cemetery is almost at the mouth of the valley, a
little way up its northern bank. It is partly in either commune.

Blighty Valley Cemetery was begun early in July 1916, at the beginning of the Battle of the Somme, and used until the following
November.

At the Armistice it contained 212 graves, but was then greatly enlarged when 784 graves were brought in from the battlefields and
small cemeteries to the east. Most of these concentrated graves were of men who died on 1 July 1916.

Duke is also commemorated on the Woking Town Square memorial and the West Downs School memorial.