Lance Corporal ARTHUR BINSTEAD

Arthur Binstead was born on 17 February 1894 in Odiham[1].  He was the third child of Walter, a grocer’s manager, and Sarah Binstead of Church Street, Odiham.  He had an older brother, Edmund and sister Elsie.  He started at Buryfields Infants School in 1897[2] and went on to the London Road Board School on 1 March 1901[3].  In 1911 he was working as a baker’s journeyman[4].

When war broke out in 1914 Arthur enlisted in Hastings and joined the 13^th (Service) Battalion, 3^rd South Down) the Royal Sussex Regiment.  His father had been born in Sussex and this may be the reason for being there in 1914.  This Battalion was formed at Bexhill on 20 November 1914 and moved to Maidstone in July 1915, where it was adopted by the War Office.  Two months later it moved to Aldershot, swiftly followed by another move, this time to Witley where it came under the command of 116^th Brigade in the 39^th Division.  In March 1916 came the move to the Western Front, via Le Havre, where the Division remained until the end of the war.

On 30^th June 1916, i.e. 24 hours before the first day of the Somme, the South Down battalions of the Royal Sussex suffered heavy casualties during a diversionary attack near Richebourg l’Avoue, which proved to be fruitless. The Division then took part in fighting on the Ancre, the Battle of Thiepval Ridge, the Battle of the Ancre heights including the capture of Schwaben Redoubt and Stuff Trench and the Battle of the Ancre.  These battles ended on 13 March 1917.  Arthur was wounded at some stage during 1916, but no details have been found to date[5].

During 1917 the 39^th Division were also involved in the battles of Third Ypres (Passchendaele). For Arthur these included the Battle of Pilkem Ridge, the Battle of Langemarck and the Battle of the Menin Road.  In what became his obituary in the Hants & Berks Gazette of 20 October 1917 it was reported that on 26^th September 1916 Arthur ‘was seriously wounded and further news is anxiously awaited by his parents’.  This was the day that he was killed in action.

 Arthur is commemorated on the Tyne Cot Memorial.  He was awarded the 1915 Star, the British War Medal 1914-20 and the Victory Medal 1914-19[6].