William Henry Thomas Woods M.M.

Appears as: Born: Parents: Unit: No.: Rank: Died: Grave/Memorial:

Woods, William H 22 August 1897 Battersea, Surrey William and Alice (née Chandler) Royal Sussex Regiment / 95 Company, Machine Gun Corps (Infantry) 3.10818 / 7661 Corporal 15 April 1918, age 20 Aval Wood Military Cemetery, Vieux-Berquin, Nord-Pas-de-Calais, France: I. AA. 31

Biography:
William Henry Thomas Woods was born, on 22 August 1897, in Battersea, Surrey. He was the son and second child of William Joshua, a pawn-broker’s
 manager, and Alice Jane (née Chandler).  He had four brothers and five sisters.

By 1905, William and his family had moved to Old Woking, Surrey.  Between 1914 and 1918, they moved to live in St John’s.

William Henry Thomas Woods was killed on 15 April 1918.  It was probably for his actions in this battle that he was awarded the Miltary Medal.



William is buried, in grave I. AA. 31, within Aval Wood Military Cemetery, Vieux-Berquin, France.

The Battle of Hazebrouck (one of the Battles of the Lys), including the Defence of Nieppe Forest, lasted from 12 to 15 April 1918.  The line east of Nieppe Forest was defended against overwhelming forces by the 29th and 31st Divisions, the latter including the 4th Guards Brigade.  Although Vieux-Berquin village was lost on 13 April, the rest of the line was held until the 1st Australian Division had detrained and arrived on the field. Aval Wood Military Cemetery, designed by Sir Herbert Baker, contains 410 Commonwealth burials and commemorations of the First World War.  155 of the burials are unidentified, but special memorials commemorate two casualties believed to be buried among them. The cemetery was made in June and August 1918, largely by the 11th Battalions of the East Yorkshire and East Lancashire Regiments, who started Plot I.  Plots II and III were added after the Armistice when graves were brought in from the battlefields of Vieux-Berquin and Merville and from Caudescure British Cemetery, which lay South of Aval Wood, a little West of the hamlet of Caudescure.  It contained the graves of 35 soldiers from the United Kingdom and one German prisoner, who fell in April-August, 1918.