Booty, George Wilson

Born Hull 1892. Enlisted Hull. Widow Frances Margaret Booty lived at 99 St Paul Street, Hull. (War Pension & CWGC)
Hull Pals Memorial Post. PRIVATE GEORGE WILSON BOOTY 21812. Born 1892, and resident at 12 Lockwood Terrace, Lockwood Street, Hull at the time of his enlistment in Beverley on 10th February 1916. George was working as a Varnish Maker’s Packer and had previous military experience having served with the 3rd Northumbrian Field Ambulance in peacetime. George was a veteran of the Arras campaign and that fateful day fighting for Oppy Wood in May 1917. He was killed in action on 12th April 1918 fighting what became know as the Battle of the Lys, a series of running skirmishes following the onset of the German Spring Offensive, as the Allies tried desperately to form a line that would hold and stop the enemy rounding them up and cutting them off. His body was never recovered and his name is commemorated on the Ploegsteert Memorial. He was 26 years old. His enlistment form states that he wasn’t married, and yet records show he left a wife, Frances Margaret Booty of St. Paul’s Street, Hull. He must have married her either before he left for France, or whilst home on leave; unfortunately, their time together was all too brief.