Arthur Algernon Pickles died of wounds on this day in 1918.
Arthur was born in 1896 in Newchurch-in-Pendle, Lancashire. His parents were John Pickles (an antique dealer and Sexton) and Hannah. Arthur had a much older brother Hartley, as well a younger brother George and a younger sister Mary Lucy.
Before the war Arthur was a cotton weaver.
Arthur was conscripted into the army in the spring of 1916. He was allocated to the 2/7th Warwicks after being sent to the Western Front in June 1917. He was involved in the 3rd Battle of Ypres and the Battle of Cambrai in 1917.
He was awarded the Military Medal for actions during the German Offensive after operating a machine-gun despite having suffered a gun-shot wound to the leg on 21 March 1918.
Initially posted as missing (this was the last time any of his comrades saw him alive), it later transpired that he had been taken prisoner by the advancing Germans, but died of his wounds in a German medical facility on 8 April 1918.
Arthur Pickles is now buried in St.Souplet British Cemetery, Nord.
8 April 1918 325151 Pte Arthur Pickles MM, 2/7th Bn Royal Warwickshire Regt
Research by David O'Mara
Sources: English Census 1901, 1911; UK Commonwealth War Graves; Church of England Births and Baptisms, Pension Records from The Western Front Association archive on Fold3 by Ancestry.
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