Linda Gowans has submitted the following:-
Herbert Weighill was born in 1894 at Southwick, second child of Herbert Harcourt Hodgson Weighill, a Marine Engineer’s Pattern Maker from Newcastle, and Elizabeth Coverdale Weighill (née Keedy) from South Shields. In 1901 they are at 25 Ancona Street, Pallion, with five children, the three oldest born in Southwick, the two younger in Pallion. The address in 1911 is 7 Atkinson Buildings, Trimdon Street: Herbert is now a Co-Operative Apprentice, Provision Dealer.
Between then and 1914 he had a thoroughgoing change of occupation, for he joined Doxfords as a rivet counter and later worked at Swan Hunter, Wallsend.
In October 1914 he enlisted at Sunderland in 18th Battalion Durham Light Infantry, the Durham Pals. On April 5th 1915 he married Isabella W. Williams at St Peter’s Church, Monkwearmouth. They lived at 3 Willmore Street; Isa W. was born in the Spring of 1916.
Herbert’s records do not survive, so we do not know if he had home leave and saw his new daughter. After service in Egypt in late 1915 his Battalion moved to France in March 1916, and on July 1st he waskilled in action on the first day of the Battle of the Somme during an attack on the village of Serre. The War History of the 18 (S.) Battalion of the Durham Light Infantry gives a detailed account of the day, with its terrible losses.
The Sunderland Echo 22/07/1916 contained two notices – the abbreviation MGS (Machine Gun School) gives us information about his service not now available from other records.
Weighill. – Killed in action on July 1st, 1916, aged 22 years. Pte. Herbert Weighill, M.G.S., D.L.I., beloved husband of Isa Weighill (nee Williams), 3, Willmore Street. He made the sacrifice.
Weighill. – Killed in action on July 1st, 1916, aged 22 years. Pte. Herbert Weighill, M.G.S., D.L.I., beloved and youngest son of Herbert and Eliz. Weighill, of 9, Hawthorn Street, Millfield. Deeply mourned.
More fighting at Serre in November 1916 cost further lives: on February 25th 1917 it was attacked and at last occupied during the German withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line. The photograph below shows what remained. On August 1st, 1932, the Thiepval Memorial was unveiled, with the names of Herbert Weighill, James Todd Stewart, and more than 72,000 others who died in the Somme sector and have no known grave. Over 90% of them died between July and November 1916. The memorial also serves as an Anglo-French Battle Memorial in recognition of the joint nature of the 1916 offensive, and a small cemetery containing equal numbers of Commonwealth and French graves lies at its foot.
Herbert Weighill is remembered in Sunderland on S140.009, S140.010, S140.0141 and S140.048 part 2 and at Wallsend on W7.03
He is also remembered in The DLI Book of Remembrance page 169
