Peterborough & The Great War

Biography

Herbert Stanley Cross was born in 1896, and the family lived at Holwood Farm, Chatteris.  His father, William was a farm worker.

Herbert enlisted into the Cambridgeshire Regiment on 12 November 1915.  He passed through Peterborough East Station and signed the visitors’ book on 15 August 1916.  Within two weeks, on 30 August 1916, he embarked for France  and had transferred to the Yorkshire Regiment by 19 September 1916.  His records indicate that he received a gun shot wound to his right arm on 29 March 1918, but by 27 May 1918, was reported missing. His name appears on German records as a prisoner captured at Berry-au-bac, just north of Reims, France.  In the action Herbert’s battalion lost (including missing) 642 other ranks, leaving just 135 men and the battalion was unable to continue as a cohesive unit.

Private Cross was held as a Prisoner of War at Stendal Camp, west of Berlin, where he remained for the duration of the war, finally being repatriated on 25 December 1918. He was discharged on 14 March 1919.

Private Cross was awarded the Allied Victory and British War medals.

Herbert returned home to Holmwood Farm, and continued as an agricultural labourer.  In 1927, he married Doris Warrington in the Huntingdon area and they had four children, Alec (1929), Peter (1931), Geoffrey (1935) and Jacqueline (1939).  In 1939 Herbert and his family were living at High Street, Huntingdon and he was listed as an agricultural labourer.  He died in Huntingdon in 1983 at the age of 87.

Please get in touch if you can tel us more about Herbert and his family.