This name is on the Stockwell Green United Reformed Church war memorial Sidney Frederick Terry (Terry, Sidney F) Captain, Wiltshire Regiment, 1st Battalion Died at Bapaume, France on 24 March 1918 Military Cross Remembered at Arras Memorial, Pas de Calais, France and on Stockwell Green URC memorial Information from the censuses and other sources Sidney Frederick Terry was born on 7 June 1894, the son of Thomas Terry, the secretary of a timber company originally from Clapham, and Florence Ann Terry, from Camden Town. In 1911 the family lived at 36 Dulwich Road, Herne Hill. Five children were registered on the census: Thomas Cuthbert Terry, 27, a "traveller" in the timber trade Florence Muriel Terry, 26 Kate Frances Terry, 25 Sidney Frederick Terry, 16, at school (St Olave's) Ernest William Terry, 11 Daisy Olive Cotton, a 31-year-old single domestic servant, lived in. In 1901 the family lived at 40 Dulwich Road, but in 1881 they were at 16 North Street, Clapham. Possibly the Stockwell Green URC was the nearest congregation suiting their religious preferences and that their association lasted although they moved some distance away. South London Press, 25 April 1919 A piece headed "Old Olavians War Record - Long Roll of Honour Further Extended", includes this praise of Sidney Terry: Capt. Sidney Frederick Terry, Wilts. Regt. killed in action March 1918, was a soldier conspicuous among the soldiers, and among the brave, of remarkable bravery, as may be gathered from the following letter sent spontaneously [to St Olave's] by Major Sholto Ogilvie, the officer commanding his battalion: "The sad announcement that my late Adjutant Capt. S. F. Terry must now be presumed to have been killed last March has recalled to me his close connection with, and deep affection for his school. St. Olave's. And so I thought you would be interested to hear how great were his services to the battalion and how much I was indebted to him. For nearly three years of the heaviest fighting on the Western Front - calling for the utmost endurance of which anyone is capable - he served with my battalion. Throughout the whole time he always displayed the very highest qualities of courage, conscientiousness, and cheefulness. No job was too hard for him: no work too much for him: no better soldier could be found along the Western Front. To my mind, however, there is, inspite of his sad death, considerable consolation in the fact that his three years with the 1st battalion of the Wiltshires were really happy years. His charm of manner and character brought him innumerable friends and never an enemy. Personally I am msot proud to have been associated with him." A tribute from an old schoolfellow contains the following fine passage: "Among the thousands who were posted missing in the first great retreat of 1918 was one who died in an old familiar way: Sid Terry had been given orders by his colonel to collect all the men he could and then to hold the enemy at all costs. The carrying out of that order - the lack of demonstration about it and the self-effacement, the bare news of an eye-witness that Sid was the last of that rear-guard left fighting there, the clear attestation of one's inward eye - reminiscent of a more boyish short, sturdy figure, of a steady gaze and a steady smile - all reads familiarly with a stamp of conviction and of foreknown truth." St Olave's School The picture of Terry is taken from a presentation by Peter J. Leonard available on the St Olave's School website at www.saintolaves.net. When you enter the site, click on 'Welcome' then on 'Chaplaincy' and scroll to the bottom. There is also a thread on St Olaves at the Great War Forum. Terry attended the school between January 1905 and July 1913. |
