A century ago, hundreds of men from Stone had left their home town for the horrors of the First World War in Europe.
Below is a list from 1915 of all the men from Stone who had signed up for the war effort. Some were already in France with the British Expeditionary Force; many others were at barracks across the UK waiting for the call.
The list gives some key information – name, regiment, where they were currently serving and their address in Stone.
It gives a startling insight into the sheer number of men who had signed up. For instance, 22 men from Victor Street had left the town by 1915.
It’s hard to imagine the impact on the hundreds of families left behind, and what life must have been like here with so many of the men gone away. Not to mention the horrors that awaited them in Europe.
Thirty-one men in the document below never made it home, 18 being killed in a single day at Loos on 13th October 1915.
It is thought that 144 men from the town lost their lives during the First World War.
