Alfred Raymond Baines was born in Hemel Hempstead on Wednesday, 9th August 1899 the second child of Alfred Baines and Kate Margrave. He had six siblings who were: Dorothy, William Stanley, Victor Leslie Berridge, Harry Ronald and Doris Kathleen. His oldest sister Dorothy died in infancy in 1897 and his youngest brother Harry died in 1904 when he was only a year old. His older brother William also served in the Great War and he survived the conflict. The Baines family lived in the Roughdown area of Boxmoor when Alfred was born and his father Alfred worked at Fosters Saw Mills in Kingsland Road as a ‘Wood Moulding Machinist’.

Alfred started his education in 1906 when he entered Two Waters ‘British School’ which was situated just off the London Road in the Two Waters area of Boxmoor. Alfred was at the school until 1912 when he left aged. One of his classmates was Albert ‘Bert’ Charge who also died in the Great War six months before Alfred. His biography also appears in this book. 

The Baines boys were active members of the nascent scouting movement and Alfred earned a number of badges as well as being one of the Boxmoor Troop ‘Buglers’. When Alfred started work he joined Fosters Saw Mills where his father worked, and Alfred trained as a ‘Clerk’, a job he would do until he went to war. On the outbreak of war Alfred was too young to enlist and he saw his brother William go off to fight in 1916 whilst he had to wait another year before he could join the Colours. He attested in Watford a month after his eighteenth birthday on 3rd September 1917 and joined the Bedfordshire Regiment. He went to train in Felixstowe before being sent to France the following year. When he was posted it seems he went to the Northamptonshire Regiment and he disembarked at Le Havre on the 1st April 1918 and joined his regiment ten days later at Escarbotin about 12 miles west of Abbeville in the Bay of the Somme. He was assigned to ‘D’ Company 7th Battalion Northamptonshires.

For the next month Alfred trained with his comrades before his unit moved up to the frontline to relieve the 4th Canadian Mounted Rifles in Hill 70 Sector at Les Brebis on the 2nd May. During the next month the Battalion carried out reliefs but the enemy was relatively quiet until towards the end of May when it began to send over gas shells. On the 1st June the Battalion War Diary recorded the following: "Enemy artillery slightly active during day. 3 O.R.s reported suffering from gas." Alfred was one of the unfortunate men ‘gassed’ and was taken down the line to hospital for treatment.

He returned to his Company around the 9th September 1918 and was back in the trenches on the frontline almost immediately. By early October Alfred was with his unit near the village of Cagnoncles approximately 1½ miles to the east of Cambrai. On morning of the 9th, ‘D’ Company were in action and the War Diary recorded the following: "Having taken the high ground on his sector, Capt. Pearson [M.C.] went personally with a strong patrol to reconnoitre the village, and failed to return". In fact, none of the patrol returned and all the men who went were confirmed ‘Killed’. Young Alfred was one on the unfortunate patrol members and he was ‘Killed in Action’ on Wednesday, 9th October 1918. He fell just 33 days before the Great War ended and was amongst the last of the Hemel Hempstead soldiers to die in the conflict.

The Baines family were members of the congregation at Boxmoor Baptist Chapel and Alfred was commemorated on a memorial plaque in the church. The plaque was subsequently removed when the church was demolished and can now be seen in Carey Baptist Church on Marlowes, Hemel Hempstead.

Alfred is Remembered with Honour Cagnoncles Communal Cemetery, Nord, France where he is interred in Grave 4. The inscription on his headstone, requested by his mother Kate reads: “OUR LOSS, HIS GAIN”

He was only 19 years old when he died.

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