Roll of Honour 2023

P AGE 115

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 STEPHEN USSHER (Capt)

Lef SES 1899

Roll Number 888 Died 16:12:1914

Set / House D

Arrive SES 1895

Where GIVENCHY, FRANCE Serving with DUKE OF CONNAUGHT’S OWN BALUCHIS

Age 32

Buried Beuvry Communal Cemetery, Pas-De-Calais, France Remembered The St. Edward’s School Chapel (Wooden Plaque), The Cloisters Stone Memorial

Born Croxall, Derbyshire in 1892, one of three SES brothers, all lost in The Great War, sons of a clergyman. He was rather under the shadow of a brilliant elder brother at the School but nevertheless made a mark for himself, a member of the Cricket XI 1899 and the Rugby Football XV 1898 and in the Upper Moderns Form when he left. He joined the Duke of Connaught’s Own Baluchis in 1904 as a regular soldier, serving almost exclusively in India until the outbreak of The Great War, by which time he had reached the rank of Captain in the 129th Battalion. Moved with his regiment to France he was killed in action early in the war at Givenchy in France. ‘His regiment was ordered to make an attack on the German trenches at Givenchy near La Bassee in the early hours. The attack was held up by German machine-guns. Ussher tried to direct the fire of his guns onto these enemy guns and while looking over the parapet to direct fire, he was hit in the forehead; he died without recovering consciousness’. His last words were’ Keep down, keep down’ to a fellow officer and his men. His regiment fought magnificently - they were the first Indian regiment go into action. ‘A Victoria Cross was awarded to one of his soldiers, the first such decoration awarded to Native troops’ (Beverley Ussher).