Henry Bean Hargreaves was born on 8 June 1890 to Frank Hargreaves and Mary Ann (nee Bean). He was baptised at St Matthew’s Church in Chapel Allerton on 17 August 1890, Frank is recorded as a “Clerk”.
The 1891 Census shows Henry with his parents living at 11 Back Allerton Terrace in Chapel Allerton. Frank was working as an Auctioneer’s Clerk, Henry was recorded as 10 months old.
By the time of the 1901 Census the family had moved to 7 Regent Terrace which is one street over from Back Allerton Terrace. Henry was now 10 years old, his father still working as an Auctioneer’s Clerk. Henry went to “Chapel Allerton Council and Higher Grade School”.
The 1911 Census records that the family had moved again, this time a short distance to 24 Hawthorn Mount. Henry was now 20 years old and working as a sign writer.
We think Henry emigrated to Australia at the beginning of 1913 arriving on the ship Armadale on 4 January 1913 in Fremantle in Queensland.
World War 1 started and Henry enlisted at Saltern in Queensland on 18 August 1915, the attestation paper shows that Henry was known as Harry, he was 24 years and 2 months old and he was working as a painter. Henry joined the 7 Reinforcements 26th Battalion Australian Imperial Force (AIF). His number was 3061.
After training they were shipped to Galipoli, I think they embarked from Brisbane, Queensland on HMAT Itonus (A50) on 30th December, 1915
I don’t know if Henry reached Gallipoli itself but on the 18 February 1916 he was transferred from to No.1 Auxilary Hospital in Cairo with mild influenza. The hospital was housed in the former Heliopolis Palace Hotel.
On the 3 March 1916, Henry was admitted to Base Camp at Zeitoun, just outside Cairo. On 21 March he embarked on the HT Oriana at Alexandria and travelled to Marseilles where he disembarked on 27 March. By the 4 April he was admitted to the 2nd Australian Division Base Depot (ABDB) at Etaples. On the 25 April he was “Taken on Strength”, that is, he rejoined the 26 Batallion 7th Infantry Brigade (A Company) for active duty. I’m not sure what action he was involved in but on 5 August he was reported as missing during the fight for Pozieres.
Pozieres, a small village in the Somme valley in France, was the scene of bitter and costly fighting for the 1st, 2nd and 4th Australian Divisions in mid 1916.
The village was captured initially by the 1st Division on 23 July 1916. The division clung to its gains despite almost continuous artillery fire and repeated German counter-attacks but suffered heavily. By the time it was relieved on 27 July it had suffered 5,285 casualties.
The 2nd Division took over from the 1st and mounted two further attacks – the first, on 29 July, was a costly failure; the second, on 2 August, resulted in the seizure of further German positions beyond the village. Again, the Australians suffered heavily from retaliatory bombardments. They were relieved on 6 August, having suffered 6,848 casualties.
The 4th Division was next into the line at Pozieres. It too endured a massive artillery bombardment, and defeated a German counter-attack on 7 August; this was the last attempt by the Germans to retake Pozieres.
https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/E84338
Henry was reported missing and due to the chaos of the fighting it wasn’t initially possible to report what had happened to him. The Australian Red Cross Society Wounded and Missing Enquiry Bureau ran an enquiry to find out what had happened and this involved contacting other members of his unit who were fighting with him that day. It took until 29 Jun 1917 to report him as “Killed in Action”, a Sergeant P. A. Arthur was able to confirm that he thought he saw Henry being hit by a shell as they were moving across no-mans land during an attack. You can read the correspondence here.
Henry is commemorated on the memorial at Villiers-Bretonneux Memorial.
Henry was awarded: