Benjamin George Oakley was born in St Pancras, London in 1892 to Henry Oakley and Rachel Bennett. He was the sixth and youngest child born to the couple and the others were; Joseph, Frances Kate, Florence Martha, Alfred Edward and Albert John Bennett.

By 1901 Benjamin was living with his mother and two of his brothers in ‘Belconey’, Leverstock Green whilst his father Henry was boarding with the Conduit family in St Pancras, London. His father worked as a ‘Carman’ so would have driven a horse and cart, an occupation commonly associated with the railway and removals companies at this time and equivalent to modern day couriers.

‘Belconey’ was one of the poorest areas of Leverstock Green in the 19th and early 20th centuries. It consisted of a long terrace of about 10 meagre dwellings, along with two pubs ‘The Mason’s Arms’ and ‘The Plough’ (which still stands today). The Biswell family lived next door to Benjamin in 1901 and it lost two sons in the Great War as well, Harry and John aged twenty and nineteen respectively.

In June 1910, the family suffered a tragedy when Benjamin’s uncle committed suicide. His mother Rachel found her brother and the “sensational” news was reported in the Hemel Gazette which stated: “SENSATION AT LEVERSTOCK GREEN - RETIRED BUTLER COMMITS SUICIDE -FOUND HANGING BY HIS SISTER. Mrs. Rachel Oakley found the body of her brother, a Mr. Bennett who had lived in Leverstock Green for about 7 years - he had previously acted as butler to the Cavendish and Gladstone families. From a variety of notes he left it was obviously suicide and at the inquest held in Leverstock Green schoolroom on Tuesday, the verdict was returned of suicide.”

By 1911 Benjamin lived at 11 Bennett’s End a short distance from Leverstock Green and he is the only child left at home with his widowed mother. He worked as a Labourer on a ‘Thrashing Machine’ but by the time he enlists he is working as a Carter for one Mr Mallard a coal, coke and firewood dealer in Apsley. Benjamin was amongst the first few men to enlist, attesting at Hemel Hempstead in the first weeks following Britain’s declaration of war.

He enlisted with the 6th Battalion Bedfordshire Regiment, a "Service" battalion, raised specifically for the duration of the war in August 1914, as a part of 'K1', Lord Kitchener's first call to arms for 100,000 men to fight for their country. Initially, the battalion was attached to the 9th (Scottish) Division at Aldershot whilst training, but when the 37th Division was formed in March 1915, the Battalion was moved to join it at Andover and trained on Salisbury Plain, where it was transferred into the 112th Brigade.

Shortly before mobilisation Benjamin was granted home leave and returned to Hemel Hempstead in July to marry Helen Beatrice Coxhill (nee. Wilson) whom he had met sometime after 1911. Helen worked as a Mill Hand at Dickinson and Co. and had been married in 1905 to John William Coxhill from Northchurch, Berkhamsted. She was the widowed mother to four young children; Dorothy, William, Violet and Beatrice and she was ten years older than Benjamin. They married in a civil ceremony on Sunday, 25th July 1915 and had only a few days of married life together before Benjamin departed for France from where he would not return. Their only son Benjamin George was born in early 1916 and would grow up having never known his father. Helen married for a third time in 1921, six years after Benjamin’s death and had another son with her new husband.

Benjamin sailed for France from Southampton aboard the “SS Empress Queen” disembarking at Le Havre in the early morning on the 30th July 1915. For the next four months the 6th Battalion was engaged in digging and improving trench defences mainly around Bienvillers-au-Bois approximately nine miles south-west of Arras. The reported casualty rates during this period were relatively light; four Killed and eighteen Wounded, mainly due to German sniping and shelling.

In early December at Bienvillers-au-Bois, the Battalion War Diary records events: "4 Dec 1915 Our artillery shelled Germans in the morning Enemy retaliated and sent about 100 shells into BIENVILLERS Numerous small howitzer shells failing to explode. Ptes Walker & Oakley wounded subsequently died, Ptes Heard & Lancaster [also wounded].”

Benjamin was killed on Saturday, 4th December 1915.

A letter of sympathy from Corporal J. Delderfield shortly after Benjamin’s death, was sent to the Gazette with a request to publish as the sender did not know Mrs. Oakley’s address. Details were published in the Hemel Gazette on Christmas Day 1915 and one hopes that Benjamin’s widow had already been made aware of the sad news rather than reading it in the local paper.

He is commemorated on the Leverstock Green War Memorial as well as the plaque in the village school.

Benjamin is Remembered with Honour at Humbercamps Communal Cemetery Extension, Pas-de-Calais, France where he is interred in Plot 1 Row D Grave 1.

He was 23 years old when he died. 

Benjamin was eligible for the 1914-15 Star, the British War Medal and the Allied Victory Medal.