Sheldrick, Bertram

Bertie was born at Thriplow, Cambridgeshire in the 1^st quarter 1889, the fourth son of John and Martha (nee Scoot) Sheldrick. He was a pupil at the Merchant Taylors School in Ashwell.

Bertie was with the Special Reserve and when war broke out he enlisted at Hitchin on 6 August 1915. He was a Private with the Bedfordshire Regiment 1^st Battalion, Regimental Number 4/6266 and served in the Western European Theatre of War, France and Flanders. He died in a Base Hospital on 19 March 1915 of gunshot wounds received in action at Neuve Chapelle.

Bertie was awarded the 1914/15 Star, the Victory Medal and the British War Medal.

He is buried at the Ste Marie Cemetery, Le Havre France, and commemorated on the St Mary’s Church Ashwell Roll of Honour and the Ashwell War Memorial.

The 1911 census shows Bertie, a general labourer, boarding at 32 Talbot Street, Hertford. Before enlisting he had been with the Army Reservists.

Bertie’s brother John was killed in action in 1917 whilst serving with the South Wales Borderers. His brothers Fred, Percy and Frank all served on the Westen Front and survived.

Events from the pages of the Royston Crow

There was sad news from the ‘Boys at the Front’. At least three were involved in the Battle of Neuve Chapelle. Private ‘Bert’ Sheldrick, of the Beds Regiment, died from his wounds at the Base Hospital in France. We have two pictures in the museum labelled Bert Sheldrick which are reproduced here.