227586 Mjr. Charles Alfred "Nobby" Clark DSO MC.British Army 9th Btn. East Surrey Regiment from:Bermondsey My grandfather Charles Clark was born in 1878 in Bermondsey and first served in the Boer War, rising through the ranks to become Lieutenant Colonel after WW1. He retired from the army around 1930. The regiment was a 'pals' regiment and gained the nickname 'The Gallants'.
During WW1 he served with with the well known author and playright R C Sherriff who wrote the famous war play "Journey's End", and they remained in contact for many years after the war.
As Commanding Officer he was captured, badly wounded, after a valiant last stand against a German advance in 1918 and was one of only twenty or so survivors from the battalion. His war diary survived which details some of that period, including his time in captivity. He was highly praised in Arthur Conan Doyle's book "The British Campaign in France and Flanders" regarding this last stand:
"On the morning of the 26th of March the new line had been occupied. The Seventeenth Corps had retired in the night to the Bray - Albert line, which left a considerable gap in the north, to the west of Frise, but this was filled up by an impromptu line made up of stragglers and various odds and ends from the rear of the army. It was in the south, however, that the attack was most severe, and here it soon became evident that the line was too long and the defenders too weak, so that it could not be maintained against a determined assault. Before the sun had risen high above the horizon it had been shaken from end to end, the Twenty-fourth Division being hard put to it to hold Fonches, while the Sixty-sixth were driven out of Herbecourt. At 9.30 the order was given to withdraw, and with their brave rearguards freely sacrificing themselves to hold back the swarming enemy, the troops -some of them in the last stage of exhaustion - fell back upon a second position. It was at this period that Major Whitworth, the gallant commander of the 2/6 Manchesters, stood at bay with his battalion, which numbered exactly 34 men. He and 17 of his men were dead or wounded after this last stand, and 17 survivors were alt that could be mustered that evening.
Before the right wing fell back to Vrely there had been a good deal of fighting. The Twenty-fourth Division, which was now a mere skeleton, was strongly attacked in the morning of March 27, and Dugan 's 73rd Brigade was pushed back towards Caix, the 8th Sussex having very heavy losses, including Colonel Hill, and Bonham, the second in-command.
The situation upon the other flank of the Twenty-fourth Division was also particularly desperate, and the 9th East Surrey, under Major Clark, sacrificed itself to cover the withdrawal of the 72nd Brigade. There were few more gallant actions in the war. Major Clark, writing from a German prison, gave a small account which enables us to get a glimpse of the actual detail of such a combat. The enemy's infantry were in force, he says, within 100 yards of his scattered line. "We managed to get back some hundred yards when I saw that our position was really desperate. The enemy were sweeping up from the south, and several lines of them were in between us and our next defensive line... We were seen and the enemy began to surround us, so I decided to fight it out. We took up position in a communication trench, and used our rifles with great effect. Grant was doing good work till shot through the head, and Warre-Dymond behaved admirably. It was a fine fight, and we held them until ammunition gave out. They then charged and mopped up the remainder. They were infuriated with us. My clothing had been riddled with shrapnel, my nose fractured, and my face and clothing smothered with blood. There are 3 officers and 59 men unwounded. The rest of the battalion are casualties. It was a great fight, and the men there simply splendid. I have the greatest admiration for them. It was a glorious end" Such were the class of men whom the East End of London sent into the New Army."
In retirement he was appointed Chief Air Raid Warden for Folkestone, Kent, in WW2 and died in the town in 1971.
|