COMMEMORATED IN PERPETUITY BY THE

Commonwealth War Graves Commission

Thomas Titchener enlisted at Abingdon to the 8th Battalion, Royal Berks Regiment. The 8th battalion were formed in Sept 1914 as part of Kitchener’s Third New Army at Reading. They attached to the 26th Division and moved to Salisbury Plain for training. In May 1915 - They moved to Sutton Veny. 16940 Private Titchener embarked for France on the 22nd October 1915 where his battalion, now transferred to the 1st Brigade of the 1st Division, had recently been engaged at the Battle of Loos. During 1916, Private Titchener gained his promotion to Lance Corporal as the 8th Battalion fought through the early stages of the Somme Offensive - The Battle of Albert, The Battle of Bazentin and The Battle of Pozieres. Unfortunately, Lance Corporal Titchener was killed on the last day of Pozieres and his body was never recovered. He is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial along with the names of more than 72,000 officers and men of the United Kingdom and South African forces who died in the Somme sector before 20 March 1918 and have no known grave. Over 90% of those commemorated died between July and November 1916. It is near the village of Thiepval, Picardy in France. Each year a major ceremony is held at the memorial on 1 July to mark the first day of the Battle of the Somme.

Walter Thomas Titchener's Mother, Father and five siblings were all born in Stanford in the Vale, Nr Wantage, Berkshire. Walter Thomas married Florence Mary Crook from East Challow in 1906. Thomas (as he preferred to be known), his wife Florence & their first child moved to Steventon in 1908 and lived at Little Lane, Steventon from 1909 to 1914. Three more children were born and they ended up moving to a larger house 'Near the School'. Leaving his widow, Florence Mary and 4 children - William Thomas (9), Rosetta May (8), Frederick Charles (6) Annie Elizabeth (4). After Thomas's death in 1916, Florence and the children moved out of Steventon and back to her home town of East Challow. She re-married in 1922. 

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