William Mead was born in Hemel Hempstead on Sunday, 18th of October 1891 at 17 Paradise. He was known as Willie to his family and his parents were William Mead and Emma Woodstock. Willie was the fifth child of ten born to William and Emma and he had seven sisters and two brothers. They were in order; Lily, Florence, Edwin and Nellie, then Lizzie, Annie Elsie May, Herbert James and finally Grace Ellen.

Willie started his education at Bury Mill End school in 1897 before moving to Boxmoor JMI school on the 25th March 1901. He left Boxmoor at the end of May 1903 and completed his education at nearby Two Waters Board School leaving in 1904 aged thirteen.

By 1911 Willie was living at 47 Albert Road in Luton and boarding with the Butterfield family. He worked for Luton Corporation as a Tramway Conductor. Luton Corporation Tramways opened its five-and-a-half mile network in February 1908 and by 1911 Balfour Beatty was operating the service on behalf of the Corporation. Willie would have earned up to £1 per week depending on experience in what was considered to be a secure job at that time.

On the outbreak of war, Willie enlisted with the Suffolk Regiment and attested at Watford in early 1915 and was assigned to the 7th Battalion. The Battalion had been formed at Bury St Edmunds in August 1914 as part of K1 (Kitchener’s First Army) and came under command of 35th Brigade in 12th (Eastern) Division. Willie was initially posted to Aldershot where he received his basic training and from where the Battalion was mobilised for war on 29th May 1915 and sent to France. Willie disembarked at Boulogne the following day before the Battalion marched to the Meteren-Steenwerk area where Divisional H.Q. was established near Nieppe, Nord Pas-de-Calais.

There was then a period of instruction from the more experienced 48th (South Midland) Division before taking over a section of the Front Line at Ploegsteert Wood on the 23rd June 1915. By September Willie was in action with the 7th Battalion at the Battle of Loos and after the initial assault the position had been held and was consolidated on the 30th September, despite heavy German shelling and counter attacks.

On the 13th October he was again in action at the Hohenzollern Redoubt as the Battalion captured “Gun Trench” and the south western face of Hulluch Quarries. It was here that Willie was killed on Monday, 18th October 1915 ironically on what the war diary describes as ‘a quiet day’. Sadly, this was also Willie’s twenty-fourth birthday. He was one of the 3,354 men of the 12th Division killed or wounded during this period and he was also the eighth man from Hemel Hempstead to die at the Battle of Loos.

Willie was an active member of the congregation at Marlowes Baptist Church in Hemel Hempstead and along with seven other soldiers who had died, he was remembered during a memorial service at the church on Sunday 29th October 1916. A brief report about the service appeared in the following week’s edition of the Hemel Gazette.

Willie is Remembered with Honour on the Loos Memorial, Pas de Calais, France on Panel 38 B.

He was 24 years old when he died.

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