Oshawa War Memorial Ottawa

Jean Longstaff has submitted the following:-

Born on 4th April 1895 in Hartlepool John was the only child of William Horsley, an iron moulder and his wife Rebecca, and by 1901 the family had moved to Stockton on Tees. On 15th September 1909 John and his mother, Rebecca, sailed from Liverpool to Quebec on SS Lake Champlain, and William joined them the following year when they had settled in Oshawa, Ontario.

June 1915 saw labourer John travel to Camp Niagara to enlist in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, he gave his mother in Oshawa as his next of kin and became Private 408797 of the 37th Battalion. Under the command of Lt-Col. C.F. Bick the battalion embarked for England on the SS Lapland at the end of November 1915 and on arrival at Shorncliffe the battalion numbered 40 officers and 1104 other ranks. In February John was one of the 405 men who were transferred to the 12th Reserve Battalion to provide reinforcements for the Canadian Corps, and on 8th May 1916 he was transferred from the 12th to the 19th Battalion as a reinforcement in the field, joining them on 10th June in reserve camp at Reninghelst as they left the trenches near Ypres.

September saw them in billets near Albert and on 15th of the month in conjunction with the French forces, the Canadian Corps attacked the German trenches near Courcelette. Under intense fire all day the objectives were gained but the battalion lost an estimated 250 men, one of whom was Private 408797 Horsley, for whom there was no record of a burial.

John Horsley is remembered in the Hartlepools on H115.30 , W111.86 and W111.54

He is also remembered in Canada on their Virtual War Memorial and in their Book of Remembrance, and on the War Memorial, Oshawa, Ontario.

Canadian Book of Remembrance
Canadian Virtual War Memorial
The CWGC entry for Private Horsley