Roll of Honour 2023

P AGE 114

W ORLD W AR O NE (1914 - 1918) INCLUDING THOSE WHO DIED LATER AS A RESULT OF THIS WAR

S T . E DWARD ’ S S CHOOL , O XFORD R OLL OF H ONOUR

Name RICHARD USSHER (Lt Commander)

Lef SES 1901

Roll Number 1078 Died 10:09:1922

Set / House B

Arrive SES 1900

Where VENTNOR, ISLE OF WIGHT Serving with ROYAL NAVY

Age 35

Buried Ventnor Cemetery, Isle of Wight Remembered The St. Edward’s School Chapel (Wooden Plaque), The Cloisters Stone Memorial

Born 1887, Ventner, Isle of Wight the youngest of three SES brothers all lost in The Great War, son of a clergyman. Richard was only at St. Edward’s for two terms before taking up a Cadetship on HMS ‘Britannia’ Training Ship in 1901. He was then in the Upper IIIrd Form. As part of his training he saw service in various parts of the world, including China in 1902-5. By 1908 he had been promoted to the rank of Lieutenant and appointed the Gunnery Officer on HMS ‘Hyacinth’, Flagship Cape Station. He also saw extensive service in the Channel Fleet. With the advent of The Great War, he was aboard the HMS ‘Hyacinth’ then transferring to HMS ‘Mersey’ which was responsible for the sinking of the ‘Koenigsberg’ in East Africa, when he was Mentioned in Dispatches in July 1915. In 1916 he was further awarded the DSO for his gunnery expertise serving on His ‘Bellerophan’ and ‘Repulse’. His rank had now risen to Lieutenant Commander. It was while he was aboard HMS ‘Repulse’ that his health broke down when the stations were radically changed from Zanzibar to the North Sea. It was during this change that he contracted Tuberculosis and he was invalided out of the Navy. A married man with two children, he travelled the world looking for a cure for his malaise without success and died in 1922. He was given a full Naval funeral, all local shops closing.