Reginald Foster – Norfolk Regiment 177825 & Essex Regiment 42001
Reginald James Foster was born in Carleton Rode on the 4th July 1894. He was the younger brother of Leonard (Ned) Foster who was one of the village’s casualties in the First World War.
Fortunately, the Attestation Papers and War Pension records survive. Reginald joined the 3rd Battalion of Norfolk Regiment in January 1915 and spent the next six months training at home. He was transferred to the 2nd Battalion of the Norfolks in September 1915, sent out to the Balkans and was stationed in the region for the next year. He suffers with malaria and is hospitalised until he is fit enough to be sent back to Britain to recover (November 1916). He is back fighting in France in June 1917 when he is transferred to the Essex Regiment. His documents are partly burnt and it is difficult to be exact.
On 1st August, he is made a temporary Lance Corporal (without pay!) and on the 5th August is fighting alongside a machine gun corps. Fifteen days later, he suffers a gunshot wound to his left thigh and is hospitalised at Etaples. He is then sent back to England for treatment – at which point he reverts to being a private. Reginald spends 51 days in hospital and is then sent to Shoreham by Sea for recuperation and “leg drill” (early physiotherapy?) where he remains for 94 further days. He is discharged from hospital in January 1918 and a month later he is transferred to the Essex 11th Battalion. On the 4th March he joins them at the Front in France.
Less than three weeks later, Reginald is wounded at the start of the German spring offensive and although he was initially reported as missing (on the 21st March), we know from later records that he suffered a gun shot wound to the left thigh (again) and was taken a Prisoner of War at Bapaume. He was taken first to Alten Grabow and later transferred to Limburg camp where he remained a prisoner until released in January 1919 and returned home; finally discharged by the Army on the 5th April, 1919. The medical board (pension records) state that Reginald had a 5 inches by 2 inches scar on his outer left thigh. He complains of pain and difficulty when walking but the board states that ‘movements of limb, normal, except slight limp.’ They also decided that his disability was only likely to last for 12 months. They classed his disability as less than 20%. (Although they clearly had a change of heart as he was later awarded a weekly pension of 8 shillings and three pence due to a 30% disability! He was also given a further year’s disability pension.)
Janet Major is Reginald’s granddaughter and currently (October 2020) resides locally. Since discovering the family’s connection to the village, she has undertaken lots of research and written up the family history which can be read below.
Reginald James was my maternal grandfather, although he was always known in the family as ‘Jim’. His parents were Horace Foster (born in 1853) and Ellen Page (born in 1859). They married in 1878.
The census of 1861 gives Horace as one of 10 children living in Upgate Street. His occupation is given as an agricultural labourer. All we know of Ellen, wife of Horace, is that she came from Swainsthorpe. During their married life they moved to Mill Road (Brittain’s Buildings) and he is listed as a Horseman on a farm.
Reginald was one of their eight children who survived to adulthood (four more died in infancy) and he was born in 1894.
Leonard Foster (called Ned) was four years older and was killed in action during the First World War. Read more about him in the War Dead section.
What we know of the siblings:
- Agnes Laura was the first born (1879). From census returns, we know that in 1901 she was working at Homefields in Norwich for the Beatley Family and in 1911 as a sick nurse in the house of Richard Meade, a land agent of Croxton, Norfolk. We think she married Herbert Smith and they had a son Donald and lived for some time in Bow Street, Little Ellingham. They were also living in Melton Constable in about 1929.
- Alice Elizabeth followed in 1881. By 1901 she was working as a servant for George and Katharine Preston in Kingston Upon Thames. The other servant working there was Ellen Fairweather from Shelfanger. Alice married Arthur Foster, a coal dealer of Fen Street, Old Buckenham in November 1915 and a son, Rex, was born in October 1918. Her husband died in 1927 and she suffered a mental breakdown. She was certified in 1929. However, she did improve and went to work as a servant for a Dr Gentle in Attleborough where she could ‘be kept an eye on’. This optimism must have been misplaced because, tragically, she hung herself just two days after moving out of hospital in the summer of 1930. I understand the son, Rex, may have been looked after by Reginald and his family (Reginald and sister Agnes were the beneficiaries of Alice’s will proved in 1930). I remember Rex. He was a very jovial man. He married a lady I knew as ‘Reenie’ and they lived at Great Ryburgh. They were the first people I remember having a refrigerator and Rex at some point trained to be a Coypu killer. He was interviewed on local television describing this! (Reenie died 1st April 2020 aged 104)
- Herbert, the first boy, was born in 1883 and all that I know of him is that in 1901 he was living at home, aged 18 and listed as a farm labourer. In 1911 he is not listed, but there seems to be a death certificate for Herbert Foster at age 27 for the winter of 1909 which may well be him.
- Bessie Ellen was the fourth child, born in 1885. In January 1914, she married Arthur William Aldous from Old Buckenham and they later emigrated to Australia. I believe it was Perth or Fremantle. They had 3 children: Veronica A E (1914), Frederick Arthur (1920) and Joyce Kathleen (born in Australia). I remember some neighbours of theirs visited us when I was a child, but as far as I know they themselves did not visit this country again.
*This shows the wedding of Veronica’s second son Fred. Bessie herself is shown marked with an ‘X’ standing between Veronica and I assume her oldest son. Bessie’s husband Fred can just be seen behind the bridegroom.
- Leonard Horace was born in 1890 (click to go to War Dead).
- Reginald James was born on 4th July, 1894, by which time the family were living in Upgate Street. We have his birth certificate. It is interesting that his father, Horace, could not write as his mark is given on the certificate – 130 years later things have improved as both my grandchildren could read fluently and write well by the age of six. (More information in separate section below)
- Dorothy May, followed in 1896. She was a servant at age 15 to a farmer Herbert Clifton in Upgate Street. In 1920 she married Sydney Royal, who I understand was in the navy and they lived in Portsmouth. I met her on a couple of occasions. She had a daughter Joan who married Eric Small and they had three children Brian, Margaret and Allen. I believe I met Brian.
- In January 1901, their youngest son Walter was born (he was 10 weeks old on the Census that year) and we think he emigrated to Canada.
More information about my grandfather, Reginald:
By the age of 16 (1911 Census) Reginald Foster is given as a Labourer on a Farm. We are fortunate to have his Soldier’s Pay book in good condition and we have made copy of this available for perusal. He joins up in 1915 when he was aged 20. His inoculations were in March 1916 and December 1917. His will is dated Feb 26th 1918, naming his father as beneficiary. The initial date of this was given as 9/4/17 but changed to 18/2/18.
He initially enlisted for the ‘Norfolk’ regiment on 6 Jan 1915 (No. 17782) but transferred to the Essex Regiment on 9/6/17 (No.42001). I have no idea if this was ‘normal’ or what might have been the reason for this.
In January 1918, whilst at Shoreham by Sea (recuperating from injury), Reg sent the postcard of himself in uniform (see above) to ‘May’ who was to become my grandmother.
He is recorded as a Prisoner of War on 21/3/18 and was repatriated to the United Kingdom on 14/1/19. He was discharged on the 15th April as ‘ceasing to fulfil army physical requirements’ and transferred to the Army Reserve. It seems poignant to note that under the category of specialist military qualifications it is noted he was a Prisoner of War.
When he returned from the war, Reginald’s pay address was Burgh Common, Attleborough so the family must have moved when he was abroad. His demobilization account records the total sum of £47 8s 0d (now worth just over £ 2,445) to restart his life. It must have seemed quite a lot!
On July 14th, 1921, Reginald married Beatrice May Reynolds at All Saint’s Church, Besthorpe. He is listed as a labourer and she is a spinster.
I do not know where they lived initially but I think for most of their married life they lived in Abbey Road, in a semi-detached wooden bungalow, which was opposite the Airfield during the Second World War. (There are two modern houses on the site now.) Reginald for all his married life was a horseman working at Park Farm.
They had three children, my mother Elizabeth (known as Betty) born in 1926, followed by a daughter Beryl in 1929, and later, in 1931, a son Russell.
My ‘nanny’ as I called Beatrice was good with her hands and I imagine made both these dresses in the photo for Elizabeth and Beryl. Finally, Elizabeth, Beryl and Russel later on; we think Russell is about 16 in this photo.
You will notice the girls have coordinating knitted lace jumpers. I am hoping to reconstruct one of these jumpers by redesigning the pattern from this photo. I imagine the pattern was from a magazine like My Weekly but despite there being a revival in vintage knitting I have failed to find the pattern!
Russell was the only one of the three to go to Thetford Grammar School which he reached by train. During the war, my mother (by then working in a grocery shop in Old Buckenham – Mrs Bye’s shop?) would bike with Russell each day to and from Attleborough Station as he was scared to do the journey himself. Having the Americans based on the adjacent airfield was both a source of joy for the family (as they got to know many of them who they kept in touch with throughout their lives) and also very tough. It must have been doubly so for Reginald knowing what he had gone through in the trenches.
In June 1948, their eldest, Elizabeth (my mother), aged 22, married Eric Smith, aged 26, an agricultural engineer living at Boro Farm, Attleborough. The wedding was at Old Buckenham Baptist Church and Reginald gave her away.
Here we have Reginald and my mother at the Baptist Church gate in Old Buckenham with finally the happy couple after the wedding at the bungalow.
Soon after my parents married, Reginald was to fall seriously ill and would no longer be able to work. As the bungalow was a ‘tied’ property, the family had to move out and the only accommodation open to them was a Nissan hut on the adjacent airfield. (Hut 12, site 4, Borough Common). Both Beryl and Russell were still living at home. Sadly, on the 19th April 1950 and at the early age of 55, Reginald died of stomach cancer. The press report of the funeral says they had ‘recently moved’ to Borough Common. He and Beatrice had been married for 29 happy years and she went on to live for another 31 years. Who knows if or how his life was shortened by his experiences in the First World War?
My mother and father (Elizabeth and Eric) moved into Heron Park Cottages, Besthorpe, which is the first pair of cottages on the left (now one cottage) as you take the Bunwell Road towards Attleborough (after the ‘bad corner’). I was born there in 1951 and my brother, John followed in 1953. When Mum was having John, also born at home, I went to stay with Nanny and still remember going up and down her hall in the Nissan Hut on a little trike.
Beryl unfortunately caught TB meningitis whilst working as a cook at The Old Folk’s Hostel, Catton Hall, Norwich. It was touch and go whether she survived and she was in isolation for a long time. She was treated with a ‘new’ drug, Streptomycin, which unfortunately left her stone deaf and profoundly affected her life. This was around the time of my birth as she thinks the last thing she remembers hearing is me screaming. She went on to marry her long-term boyfriend, Reg Howlett, and lived in Norwich. I was about 3 and a bridesmaid. She was unable to have children due to her treatment for TB meningitis.
Russell did very well at Grammar School but felt he could not go to university and must work to help support his mother. I remember him working as a Gravel Pit Manager for Pointers for many years and the last big job, I think, was at at Pensthorpe, where the gravel workings were turned into the country park. He married when I was a teenager but there were no children.
My father worked as an agricultural engineer for Larkman for most of his life. He enjoyed engineering and was always making and modifying tools. My mother was very much a knitter and sewer in all her spare hours. After school, my brother John worked for the Waterboard for many years which became Anglian Water. He had 2 children from his first marriage and now has a granddaughter.
For myself, after finishing school I did a science degree and then postgraduate certificate enabling me to teach Science. I met my husband Michael during this time and we both taught science in London, then In Norfolk, Suffolk and Cheshire. Throughout my life I have been interested in sewing, knitting and more recently spinning, dyeing and weaving, carrying on the female family interests. We have a son, Robert who is an A and E consultant and Dr for the Air Ambulance. He lives with his wife in Spooner Row and they have two boys. We moved back from Cheshire to be nearer to them and found ourselves living in Carleton Rode. We have now found out that both sides of my parents family have lived in the village and we would like to thank Penny and Simon for finding out so much about them for a Remembrance Day exhibition at the Church in 2019. When I saw information about Leonard Foster, I realised he was a great uncle of mine!