Arthur Williams

Home page

Appears as:

Born:

Parents:

Unit:

No.:

Rank:

Died:

Grave/Memorial:  		Williams, Arthur

5 September 1892, Bristol, Somerset

Jesse and Annie (née New)

1/5th Battalion, The Queen's (Royal West Surrey) Regiment

T.2394 / 240626

Private

21 June 1918, Iraq, age 25

Amara War Cemetery, Al Amarah, Iraq: XII. G. 13. 		      

Biography:
Arthur Williams was born on 5 September 1892, in Bristol, Somerset. He was the son and eldest child of Jesse, a domestic coachman, and Annie (née
New). He had two brothers. His father died, in January 1898, when Arthur was five.

By 1901, Annie and her sons had moved to Woking and were living in Board School Road. In 1903, Annie married Samuel Robert Tutt, a tailor, and had
another son with him – they were then living in Knaphill.

Arthur Williams joined The Queen's (Royal West Surrey) Regiment Territorial Force in 1914, serving with 1/5th Battalion. He probably did not volunteer
for overseas service as he was not deployed until at least 1916 (not eligible for 1914/15 star).

Arthur Williams died of dysentery on 21 June 1918, in modern-day Iraq. He is buried, in grave XII. G. 13, within Amara War Cemetery, Al Amarah, Iraq.

His two brothers, Ernest and Leonard Williams are also both commemorated on the St John’s memorial.


Amara was occupied by the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force on 3 June 1915 and it immediately became a hospital centre. The accommodation for medical units on both banks of the
Tigris was greatly increased during 1916 and in April 1917, seven general hospitals and some smaller units were stationed there.

Amara War Cemetery contains 4,621 burials of the First World War, more than 3,000 of which were brought into the cemetery after the Armistice. 925 of the graves are unidentified. In
1933, all of the headstones were removed from this cemetery when it was discovered that salts in the soil were causing them to deteriorate. Instead a screen wall was erected with the
names of those buried in the cemetery engraved upon it. Plot XXV is a Collective Grave, the individual burial places within this are not known.