Rank:
Gunner
Service No(s):
93672
Regiment:
Royal Garrison Artillery
Unit:
124th Heavy Battery
Returned:
No
Place of birth:
Edmonton, Middlesex
Occupation:
Insurance clerk
Date of death:
23/01/2017
Cause of death:
Accident
Grave or panel reference:
1. A. 7
Name of father:
Charles Weeden
Name of siblings:
Charles Thomas Weeden, Ernest William Weeden, Gertrude Elizabeth Weeden, Stanley Victor Weeden
Name(s) of children:
Died:
Yes
Date of birth:
Place of enlistment:
Southend-on-Sea
Event:
France (post-Battle of the Somme)
Age at death:
34
Cemetery or memorial:
Dartmoor Cemetery, Becordel-Becourt
Other memorial:
Prittlewell, Southend-on-Sea
Name of mother:
Sarah Weeden (née Day)
Name of spouse:
Madeleine Edna Chipp
Address:
Ground-floor flat, 2 Hillfield Avenue, Hornsey North
Biography:
Arthur James Weeden was born in the spring of 1882 in Edmonton, north London, to Charles and Sarah Weeden (née Day). He was their fourth child – and one of four whom they outlived. Gertrude, the middle child, was a teenager when she died in 1897, and eldest sons Charles, an insurance clerk, and Ernest, a draper, died in 1899 and 1915 respectively, Ernest leaving a widow, Florence, and a young son, also Charles.
The family lived in Lancaster Road, Stroud Green, then Denton Road, Hornsey, where they employed two domestic staff. Arthur followed his eldest brother into the insurance business and, in 1910, he married Madeleine Edna Chipp. The 1911 Census lists them as living in Hillfield Avenue, Hornsey, but by the time of the following census, in 1921, Arthur and Madeleine’s younger half-brother, Frederick, were among the fallen commemorated by the Hunter organ at New Court Congregational Church.
Arthur enlisted at Southend and served as a Gunner with the Royal Garrison Artillery on the Western Front. He was killed on 23 January 1917, when the Commonwealth War Graves Commission has him as being with the 124th Heavy Battery. However, the UK Army Register of Soldiers’ Effects puts him with the 203rd Heavy Battery and gives his place of death as a 4th Australian Field Ambulance.
Rolls of honour in Southend, where Arthur’s parents were now living, and in nearby Prittlewell, both carry his name, and the latter provides detail of the apparent futility of Arthur’s death. ‘Age 34, when run down by an Army Service Corps vehicle.’ He is buried at Dartmoor Cemetery in Becordel-Becourt.
The Index of Wills gives Arthur’s final address as 30 Upper Tollington Park, Stroud Green, which was once Madeleine’s family home and is where, one may assume, they had moved while Arthur was in France. It was also home to Frederick Chipp, who was wounded in 1916, developed tuberculosis and died in 1920. Stanley Weeden, Arthur’s younger brother who is commemorated on the returning soldiers’ plaque at New Court, was the only one of the five children to outlive Charles and Sarah, who appear on the 1921 register of members at the church at their former address in Denton Road.