Person    | Male  Born /6/1894  Died 21/4/1915

Soldier in the Queen Victoria Rifles killed in Ypres.

Andrew Behan has researched Smith: Lance Corporal Norman Hattersley Smith was born in June 1894 in Conisbrough, Yorkshire, the second child and elder son of the three children of William Smith and Ellen Smith née Cocker. His father was a Certificated Schoolmaster. The 1901 census shows the family living at The School House, Conisbrough, Doncaster, Yorkshire together with a general servant. On the night of the 1911 census it is recorded that he was visiting 'Conyngsbury', Longley Road, Wealdstone, Middlesex, the home of Reginald Frederick Arden and Lydia Arden, née Cocker. Both he and Frederick Arden were shown on the census as Railway Clerks.

In 1912 he joined the territorial army, enlisting in 1st/9th (County of London) Battalion, The London Regiment (Queen Victoria's Rifles) and his service number was 1376. He entered France on 4 November 1914 and was killed in action, aged 20 years, on 21 April 1915. An article in the Mexborough Times dated Saturday, 1st May 1915 reads:

'News has been received by Mr and Mrs W Smith, Conisbrough, that their son, Lance Cpl Norman Smith, Queen Victoria's Rifles, North London Brigade, has been killed in action. The sad tiding was brought by Mrs Smith's sister from London. Lance Cpl Smith was engaged until last August in the manager's office, Marylebone Great Central Railway. A letter to the office from one of the staff now serving stated that several of the clerks had been wounded and Lance Cpl Smith had been killed last Wednesday. It is thought he received a fatal injury at Hill 60. The sergeant of the deceased's company had been wounded and in hospital and Lance Cpl Smith was in charge of that particular section. At the time he was loading rifles and directing fire, when a shell burst close to him. He would have been 21 in June. He received his early training at Morley Place School, of which the deceased's father, Mr W Smith, has been headmaster for 25 years. After leaving there he was about four years at Mexborough Secondary School. A letter was received on Wednesday morning from the head of the office where the deceased had been engaged since he left the secondary school, expressing the sympathy of the whole staff, and saying how well he was doing in this particular work, and that he had been marked out as likely for promotion. Previous to mobilisation in August, he was a territorial in the Queen Victoria's Rifles, and volunteered for the front and went out in November. On one occasion he was in a barn which was shelled, several being killed and about 70 injured. He had his pipe knocked out of his mouth by a piece of shrapnel. In January he suffered from frostbite and was in hospital for a few days. Otherwise he had been actively engaged in the fighting line, and had never been touched. Mr and Mrs Smith received a letter written by their son on 18 April, in which he said he had been resting for a few days and quite cheerfully saying he was very well indeed. The bereaved  parents have received many expressions of sympathy'.

As he has no known grave he is commemorated on Panel 54 of the Ypres Menin Gate Memorial, West Flanders, Belgium. His father was sent his army effects totalling £5-0s-7d on 12 August 1915 and a £3-0s-0d war gratuity on 26 February 1919. He was posthumously awarded the 1914 Star with the '5th August - 22nd November 1914' clasp, the British War Medal 1914-1918 and the Victory Medal. He is also commemorated on the War Memorial located within Coronation Park, Low Road, Conisbrough, Doncaster.

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