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Logan Jagger Grace

Logan J GracePrivate Logan J. Grace, 4506, York and Lancaster Regiment, 1/4 (Hallamshire) Battalion

Logan Jagger Grace was born in Ossett on the 16th April 1894 and baptised at Ossett Holy Trinity Church on the 19th August 1894. He was the elder son of four children born to miner Albert Edward Grace and his wife Mary Alice (nee Jagger) who married in Ossett Holy Trinity Church on the 22nd November 1890.

By 1901, Albert and Mary Alice and their four children, including Logan, were living at Westfield Street, Ossett and Albert was working as a banksman in the local pit. In 1904, at the age of 37, Logan’s father, Albert died leaving Mary Alice with four children, all under the age of 11 years.

Logan was 18 in 1911 and following the death of his father in 1904, he was the most senior male in the family’s two-roomed home at Audsley’s Yard, Healey Road, Ossett. Logan was working as a leather carrier with a local athletic goods manufacturer. His mother and two sisters worked in local mills and his 10 year-old brother was still at school.

On the 20th September 1913, Logan, now aged 19, married 19 year old spinster Eliza Riley in her parish Church of St Matthews at West Town, Dewsbury. By this time he was working as a football maker. In early 1914 their first child, Ivy, was born and in early 1916 a second child, George, was born to the couple, but sadly he died, at, or shortly after, his birth.

Logan’s army service record has not survived, but it is known that he enlisted at Dewsbury and joined the 1/4 (Hallamshire) (T.F.) Battalion of the York and Lancaster Regiment with regimental service number 4506. He was killed in action on the 15th February 1917 and posthumously awarded the British and Victory medals but not the 1914/15 Star indicating that he did not serve overseas before 31st December 1915.

1/4th (Hallamshire) Battalion was formed in August 1914 at Sheffield as part of the 3rd West Riding Brigade, West Riding Division. They moved on mobilisation to Doncaster and again in November 1914 to Gainsborough, going on in February 1915 to York. On the 14th April 1915 the battalion landed at Boulogne. On the 15th May 1915, the formation became 148th Brigade in the 49th (West Riding) Division.

On the 12th February 1917, 1/4 (Hallamshire) Battalion, York and Lancaster Regiment relieved 1/4 KOYLI in the trenches on the front line at Grosville. The positions at Grosville and Bellacourt were shelled by the Germans on the 13th February and it is likely that Private Logan Grace was wounded and died later from his injuries on the 15th February 1917.

The Commonwealth War Graves Commission records Logan’s parents as William and Mary Alice Grace of Ossett and that he was the husband of Eliza Grace of 165, Whitehead Buildings, Huddersfield Road, West Town, Dewsbury, which was the home of her parents. Logan’s father was Albert Edward and not William (Willie Grace was Logan’s brother).

There is no record of Logan’s mother being remarried. It is not known if Logan’s wife, Eliza remarried, but in 1930 a marriage was recorded at Dewsbury between Eliza Grace and George Fotherby. They appear not to have had children.

Logan Jagger Grace is not remembered on any Ossett Memorial or Roll of Honour even though he and his family continued to live in the town at least until 1911. He was also baptised at Ossett Holy Trinity Church and his parents married there. It may have been the case that Logan left Ossett to live in West Town Dewsbury shortly after his marriage in 1913.

He is remembered in this 2014 biography and Roll of Honour because the Commonwealth War Graves Commission and/or the "U.K. Soldiers who Died in the Great War 1914-1918" listing records him as born or residing in Ossett.

Private Logan Jagger Grace, son of William and Mary Alice Grace, of Ossett, Yorkshire; husband of Eliza Grace, of 165, Whitehead Buildings, Huddersfield Rd., West Town, Dewsbury, died aged 23 years on the 15th February 1917. He is buried at grave reference I.K.4. at the Bellacourt Military Cemetery Riviere,1 Pas de Calais, France. Bellacourt is a village in the commune of Riviere, in the Department of the Pas-de-Calais, 10 kilometres south-west of Arras.

The cemetery was begun by French troops in October 1914, and carried on by the 46th (North Midland), 55th (West Lancashire), 58th (London), 49th (West Riding) and other Divisions, and later by the Canadian Corps, from February 1916, to September 1918; and the French plot was increased in 1923 by concentrations from other cemeteries. The 16 American graves of July and August, 1918 (all but one of which belonged to the 320th Regiment) have been removed to another place of burial.

There are 432 Commonwealth burials of the 1914-18 war commemorated in this site, 1 being unidentified. There are also 117 French burials here.

The Cemetery covers an area of 3,582 square metres and is enclosed by a rubble wall.

References:

1. Commonwealth War Graves Commission web site