Pte. H. Bell

FIRST NAMES: Harry

UNIT: 2/5th North Staffordshire Regiment

NUMBER: 202131

STATUS: Killed in Action

DATE OF DEATH: 21st March 1918 (27th March 1918?)

CEMETERY OR MEMORIAL: Cabaret-Rouge British Cemetery, Souchez

AGE: Unknown

Harry Bell was born in Bedale and he enlisted in Bedale, though he was living in Northallerton at the time. He originally enlisted in the Yorkshire Regiment (No. 2997) but was later posted to the North Staffordshire Regiment.

On 21st March 1918 the Germans launched the first assault of their final offensive of the War. Their stormtroopers, helped by the misty conditions, broke right through the British line and into the open country beyond. Harry Bell was in the front line near the village of Bullecourt. This area saw some of the most vicious fighting of the day when the Germans attacked at 9.00am after an overwhelming artillery bombardment. At the end of the day the North Staffordshires had lost, 22 officers, including their Commanding Officer, and 539 men. Harry was reported missing on 21st March, when his battalion was overwhelmed, and was assumed to have died on that date. The subsequent CWGC concentration record, however, places his remains in German Grave 297 at Auberchicourt German Cemetery and gives 27 March 1918 as his date of death. The six-day interval, the considerable distance between Bullecourt and Auberchicourt, and the documented presence of German field hospitals and British wounded prisoners at Auberchicourt make it highly plausible that Harry was wounded, captured and evacuated into German hands, where he died approximately six days later. His body was then buried by the Germans at Auberchicourt before being exhumed and transferred to Cabaret-Rouge after the war in 1924.

Harry is buried in Cabaret Rouge Cemetery, in which many graves from over 100 different cemeteries in the surrounding area were concentrated after the War and which now contains almost 8,000 graves.