Story
Having twice suffered from shell-shock when serving in France, Private Edwin Charles Budden was posted back to England where he married in February 1918. But tragedy was about to knock on his door. His wife gave birth to a boy in the following October – they called him William James – but the baby died, with his father at his side, of influenza just seven days later. At the time a pandemic of Spanish flu was sweeping across the world. Private Budden, a labourer who had , before the war, been a member of the 3rd Battalion of the Dorset Regiment Militia and who lived in Fancy Road, Newtown, Poole volunteered to fight a month after war was declared in August 1914. He was 28 years and seven months old, stood at 5ft 6ins, had a 38ins chest, a fresh complexion, grey eyes, dark brown hair, was C of E and had a tattoo on his right forearm. He gave his next of kin as his mother and father, who lived nearby in Ringwood Road, Newtown. Private Budden joined the Dorset Regiment where he was given the regimental number 10890 but later, in 1918, transferred to 608 Company of the Labour Corps where his number was 528322. His first 310 days were served at home in Britain where he amassed a remarkable number of minor offences on his record card. It began a month after enlisting when he was absent from the tattoo at Worgret Camp where he was based and forfeited two days' pay. Two weeks later, he overstayed his pass by 21.5 hours and forfeited one day's pay. There would be a total of 11 offences against him for similar absent from tattoo-type offences before he was posted to France for the first time on 18 July 1915. He was posted back to Britain towards the end of that year but, after two months, returned to the British Expeditionary Force that was fighting in France and Belgium on 22 January 1916. Private Budden was in the 6th Battalion of the Dorsets that fought at the Battle of the Somme where, on July 8, they captured Wood Trench but suffered 250 casualties. It is believed Private Budden was injured two days later, suffering from slight shell shock. It was serious enough from him to be posted back to Blighty. He served at home from the 11 July 1916 to mid-December when Private Budden was sent back to the Western Front for a third time. In April 1917, he was wounded for a second time. Again, he suffered 'slight shell shock' and was treated at the general hospital in Rouen. He remained serving in France to 7 August 1917. Over his three posts to France he had been at or near the front line for a total of 531 days. Back in Britain, Private Budden was transferred, in the February of 1918 from the Dorsets to 609 Agricultural Company of the Labour Corps. When he was finally demobbed in March 1919, five months after his baby son had died, he was judged to be suffering from a 20 per cent disability and was granted a weekly pension of 5s 6d (worth about eight pounds today.) It was to be reviewed in 39 weeks. Edwin Charles Budden – often referred to as Charles – was born in what was then the 'Kinson' district of Poole in 1886. He was the daughter of Edwin (sometimes Edward) and Mary Jane Budden (nee Rogers). His father was a brickmaker and, when Edwin Charles was five the family were living at Newtown, Poole on the Old Wareham Road. Ten years later saw the Buddens still at Old Wareham Road in Newtown and the 15-year-old Edwin Charles was working as a tranter's carter. By 1911, however, his trade was listed at labourer in the national census. He was shown to be one of six brothers and one sister living with his parents in Newtown (although his mother, confusingly, was recorded as having had seven children, of whom two had died.) On 23 February 1918, Edwin Charles, by now a soldier who had served for four years' service under his belt, married Elsie May Clapcott, seven years his junior. Like the Buddens, the Clapcotts had lived for many years in the Newtown area, on the Old Wareham Road. Her father, Henry, had once been a marine dealer but, by 1911, was recorded as a horse slaughterman and, later, as a horse dealer. Elsie was 23 when they married at St Clements Church in Kinson Lane. (Edwin Charles's younger brother, Arthur, would, soon afterwards, marry another of young woman by the name of Clapcott.) Within a year Elsie May gave birth to their son, William, who sadly, passed away just a week later. Edwin would soon have more cause to grieve for soon his young wife Elsie May, would also die. She was buried on 16 May 1922 at the churchyard at St Clement's where, four years earlier she had walked up the aisle. She was 27 years old. Edwin Charles, whose mother would pass away before the decade was out and who was still living in Newtown, died in 1935 at the age of just 49 years. His father, Edwin Budden, who had carried on living in the Ringwood Road area of Poole, passed away 15 years later on 9 November 1950 at the age of 84. * Please contact us if you wish to suggest an amendment or have additional information.