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Lance Corporal George William Starbuck was born in 1875 at Stathern. The 1911 census tells us that he was then living in Derby, married to Minnie, and aged 36, with 6 children (the youngest being a few months old) and he was working as a tailor. We believe he was in the territorials because on the outbreak of war in August 1914 he enlisted as a Private in the Sherwood Foresters, Notts and Derby Regiment at the age of almost 40, although he declared his age as 35. By then he had 7 children. It was an advanced age for a front-line soldier; there could have been few older than him fighting in the trenches.

 

We know that in April 1915 he was appointed a Lance Corporal in the field, and that his record already shows a history of illness. On 11 July the records show that his division was in the trenches at Sanctuary Wood near Ypres. They then marched 15 miles to new trenches, but he became unwell and was sent to the Division Rest Station. By 17 July he had been passed down the line and admitted to the ambulance train that took him to Le Harve Hospital, where he collapsed and died 3 days later. One record says that he had been gassed, but an autopsy found that he died from heart failure. He was buried in the Cemetery of Ste. Marie, Le Harve. Six months later his widow Minnie was awarded a pension of 31 shillings a week to bring up 7 children, the eldest being just 12 years old.

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Roger Hawkins, November 2015