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4324 1st/13th Kensington Battalion, London Regiment
Charles Bayes was born in 1883 in Kings Lynn, Norfolk one of six children of Alfred and Mary Ann Bayes. His father was a cocoa mat weaver. William Armes originally had their matting factory in King’s Lynn, so it is probable that Alfred Bayes was employed there and moved his family to Sudbury at the same time William Armes moved the business there.
The family lived in Bridge Terrace, East Street. By 1911 Charles had left the family home and was boarding in Oxford Street, London where he was employed as a draper’s porter.
He enlisted in Kensington with the London Regiment and first served in France on 2 September 1915. On 1 July 1916 the battalion, which formed part of 168th Brigade, 56th (London) Division saw action in the diversionary attack at Gommecourt on the opening day of what we now refer to as the Battle of the Somme. The battalion’s job was to re-supply the London Scottish as they advanced but they were blasted by relentless artillery fire and the re-supply was abandoned in no-man’s land. Casualties that day for the 56th Division were over 4,000 killed, missing or wounded.
Charles was killed in action: ‘instantaneously by a shell’ on 10 August 1916. He was aged 33 and lies buried in Hebuterne Military Cemetery, Somme, France. In a letter dated 11 August 1916 Captain Lionel Cohen to his mother he described Charles as having ‘steady and excellent conduct’ which ‘got him the position of Regimental Policeman.’
Charles was awarded the 1914-15 Star, British War Medal and Victory Medal.
A Cross of Remembrance was laid by his grave in April 2006, March 2007, April 2009, October 2011, 2014 and June 2015. (His grave lays only a few rows from the author’s great uncle).
Hebuterne was known by the troops as ‘About turn’. There were billets and a water point there for troops going to and from the front line. The village green earned the name of ‘Shell Green’ as in the early evening the troops would tend to gather there, the enemy soon learnt about this and would often shell the green at this time.
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