2nd/Lieutenant Cuthbert Horsfall
Worcestershire Regiment
Lived at 18 Carr Road, Nelson
Died of Wounds 17th February 1918
Buried in Foreste Communal Cemetery, France

"Second Lieutenant Cuthbert Horsfall of Brierfield/Nelson, later of Cape Town, South Africa. Cuthbert was born in Gisburn in 1883 to Titus and Annie Horsfall, the eldest of their six children. The family was residing in Brierfield by 1891, Titus being a Nelson native and strongly involved in the local Horsfall family brewery.
Titus died young, and by 1901 Cuthbert was the oldest male in the household, aged 17 and working as an ironmongers apprentice. He had also been a student at Burnley Grammar School around this time. At some point between 1904 and 1911 he emigrated to South Africa, taking up residence in Cape Town and finding employment as a mental health nurse in Valkenberg Psychiatric Hospital. At this time it is noted that he was missing most of the index finger of his right hand, which may have been due to an accident from his ironmongery apprenticeship.
On 27/08/1915 Cuthbert was accepted for service as a Private in the South African Medical Corps, now aged 33. One month later he boarded the Balmoral Castle, and on 14/10/1915 he arrived in England, being posted to Tweseldown Camp near Aldershot. He served as an operating theatre nurse for the Venereal Division from 03/11/1915 to 20/12/1915, and was at Bournemouth Nursing Section from 07/06/1916. The details of his service between-times and following this are a little unclear, but he seems to have ended up on Western Front service.
On 24/12/1916 a file was submitted by the Lieutenant Colonel in command of Cuthbert’s SAMC hospital recommending him for a commission. This was accepted, and on 30/05/1917, whilst serving attached to the 1st Regiment of South African Infantry in France, he was ordered to present himself for transfer to Officer Training Corps. He joined the 19th Officer Cadet Battalion on 05/07/1917, and a photograph of him with the 19th OCB taken in October of 1917 exists in a private collection.
Having completed his training as an officer Cuthbert was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the Worcestershire Regiment. He arrived back in France on 06/01/1918 initially joining the 2/7th Battalion, but was transferred to attachment with 2/8th Battalion taking up duties as the battalion’s Transport Officer. Unfortunately (as the gravestone image might have given away) this narrative is not going to end positively. A telegram was received by his mother at 18 Carr Road in Nelson in late February of 1918. “Deeply regret to inform you 2/Lt C Horsfall Worcester Regt died of wounds February Seventeenth. The army council express their sympathy.”
On 17/02/1918 Cuthbert had apparently been standing outside his hut in France when a bomb was dropped by an enemy aircraft and exploded near to him, terribly wounding him and knocking him unconscious. He never woke up, and died in 2/3rd Field Ambulance.