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William Hawkins was born in 1883 at Fittleworth, Sussex and attested for the 2nd Life Guards at Petworth in June 1912. He deployed to France on 9 October 1914 with 2nd Life Guards forming part of the 7th Household Cavalry Brigade, 3rd Cavalry Division.

He would have been present at the Battle of Langemarck, 21-24 October 1914 and he was recorded for official purposes to have been killed in action on 29 October 1914 during the action at Zandvoorde which concluded with the loss of Lord Worsley’s Machine-Gun Section in a famous bloody last stand with the Royal Horse Guards on 30 October.

A note in the recipient’s service file provides the following further information;

‘Went out to France in the early part of October 1914, reported wounded and prisoner of war but could never be traced. After two years reported missing presumed to have been killed on 30 October 1914.’

Bombardment and onslaught at Zandvoorde;

‘Kavanagh’s 7th Cavalry Brigade was at the very centre of a most determined attack, supported by some 250 guns, delivered by the first of the new German Reserve divisions. These consisted in large part of ‘the flower of the youth of Germany, middle- and upper class students’, under military-age volunteers, hardly trained but burning with patriotism. Their assault fell chiefly upon the Household Cavalry’s elementary trench lines at Zandvoorde. The artillery barrage dropped on these and on the zone immediately behind them from 6.45 till 8 a.m. It and the following onslaught were so ferocious and concentrated that two squadrons and a machine-gun section suffered almost total extinction. Ernest Hook, a surviving Lifeguardsman, recalled that there was ‘no protection from the shelling as our trenches were on the forward slope and in full view of the enemy and although our gunners put up a great show, they were no match for Jerry’s heavy stuff. We could see their infantry in great masses about 1,000 yards away. Just about then I was hit by a shell that nearly took my left arm off and my officer sent me to the rear. It was the end of the war for me.’ (A History of the British Cavalry 1816-19 volume 7 by the Marquess of Anglesey refers).

William Hawkins was the son of Annie Hawkins of 120 Upper St., Fittleworth, Sussex and the late William Hawkins and is commemorated on the Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial, Belgium. He is also named on the Household Cavalry Monument at Zanvoorde.

1914 Star, with later slide clasp (2843 Tpr. W. Hawkins. 2/Life Gds.); British War and Victory Medals (2843 Tpr. W. Hawkins. 2-L. Gds.).