Alfred Frank Luck was born in Camden, Middlesex in March 1886 to Alfred and Sarah Luck. Alfred and Sarah had five children of whom three are known: Alfred, Edith May and Florence. The other two children died in infancy. His sister Edith married Frederick Room from Dunstable who was also killed in the war in 1918. Frederick’s biography also appears on this site.

When Alfred was born his family where living in Camden in London where his father worked as a ‘Clerk’ for the Midland Railway. By 1891 his father’s job took the family to Harpenden where Alfred’s parents had originally lived.

By 1901 Alfred and his father were both employed by Abbott, Anderson & Abbott Ltd, manufacturers of oilskins and rubber goods at the Heathfield Works in Harpenden. Alfred worked as a ‘Stopper Counter’ whilst his father was a ‘Store Keeper’.

By 1903, the Luck family had moved to Boxmoor near Hemel Hempstead and lived at 6 Two Waters Road in the village. Alfred had found new employment and worked for Baldersons as a ‘General Labourer’ and no doubt to enhance his wages, he decided to join the Militia. In December of the same year he enlisted with the 4th Bedfordshire Regiment but his service was short-lived. On the 30th January 1904 he was discharged for “having made a misstatement as to age on enlistment”. He had attested claiming to be seventeen years and ten months old when in fact he was sixteen years and ten months, too young to enlist.

After he left the Militia, Alfred met Annie Maple from Wilstone, Tring and they married in Hemel Hempstead in the late Spring of 1907. They had three children together; Alfred Charles, Violet May and Ernest Frank and by 1911 they were lodging with the Carter family in Hammerfield between Crouchfield and Hemel Hempstead.

By this time Alfred worked for James Major Picton, a ‘Boot Maker’ by trade but, when Alfred joined the Colours, Picton was landlord of the Steam Coach pub on St John’s Road in Boxmoor having taken it over from his mother Lydia, who had in turn had taken over management of the pub from her late husband Daniel.

Alfred enlisted in 1915 attesting at Hemel Hempstead in June and joining the Hertfordshire Regiment. When his basic training was completed he was posted to the 1/1st Battalion known as the “Hertfordshire Guards”. He was sent to France at the beginning of 1916 and joined his Battalion at Ham-en-Artois. He was with the 1/1st Battalion when, in February, it transferred to the 118th Brigade in the 39th Division, which comprised: 1/1st Hertfordshires, the 1/1st Battalion Cambridgeshire Regiment, the 1/6th Battalion Cheshire Regiment and finally the 4/5th Battalion Black Watch - amalgamated with the 1/4th and 1/5th Battalions.

Alfred fought in a number of engagements throughout 1916 but saw his most significant action at the Battle of Ancre in November. The Battalion War Diaries recorded the events as follows: "12 and 13-11-16. In the evening the battalion left billets and marched in light fighting order to the SCHWABEN REDOUBT where it formed up in assembly positions in four lines. At 5.45am on the 13th just before dawn and in a thick mist the guns opened fire, the Bn went forward, the Cambridgeshires on the left and the East Lancs (19th Division) on the right. Direction was kept and the Bn had very soon taken all its objectives, capturing the whole of the HANSA line and advancing to a depth of 1,600 yards. Over 250 prisoners were captured and many Germans were killed. The new line was consolidated and the Bn held the new position till the night of the 14th/15th. During the period the Germans made three small raids against the bombing post on our left but these were successfully driven back. In all these operations 9 machine guns were captured. The Bn was relieved on the night of 14th/15th by the Kings Own and marched back to huts near AVELUY, its last platoon leaving the trenches at 5.0am. During the period our casualties were; 7 Officers wounded, 20 OR killed, 5 OR missing, and 115 OR wounded."

Alfred was one of the twenty O.R. killed during the attack and he died on Monday, 13th November 1916.

His death was reported, shortly after he was killed, in the Hemel Gazette which published a letter that his wife had received from his C.O. 2nd Lieutenant Eric Smallwood.

Alfred was commemorated on a memorial plaque in St John’s Church in Boxmoor.

Alfred is Remembered with Honour on the Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France, Pier and Face 12C

He was 30 years old when he died.

Alfred was entitled to the British War Medal and the Allied Victory Medal.