BORN CHAPELTOWN, LEEDS, 1888. PARENTS WERE BOTH DESCEASED AND HE LIVED AT 3, DE GREY TERRACE, LORNE STREET, ANLABY ROAD, HULL, WITH HIS AUNT, FANNY & SETH CHAPMAN – (ARMY RECORDS ADDRESS). A TRADESMAN, HE ENLISTED IN HULL. JOINED THE 12TH EAST YORKSHIRE BATTALION, (3RD HULL PALS). SERVED IN EGYPT AND FRANCE. KILLED IN ACTION 08/03/1917, AGED 29. HIS DEATH WAS REPORTED IN THE HDM 07/04/1917. BURIED AT EUSTON ROAD CEMETERY, COLINCAMPS, SOMME, FRANCE.
HIS NAME WAS RECORDED AS R.W. CHAPMAN, 12TH EYR, ON THE WAR MEMORIAL AT ST THOMAS CHURCH, CAMPBELL STREET, WHICH WAS DESTROYED IN AN AIR RAID DURING WW2.
Hull Pals Memorial Post. L/CPL WILLIAM ROBERT CHAPMAN 12/889. Born in Chapeltown, Yorkshire in 1888 William was the second of four children to Lyth and Charlotte Chapman. A Rullyman by trade and living in Hull when war broke out, he enlisted at City Hall on 5th October 1914 joining the 12th Battalion East Yorkshire Regiment, 3rd Hull Pals. Leaving Hull for the training camp at Dalton Holme on February 16th 1915, he moved then to Ripon in June, and on to Salisbury in October. From there the next stop was Egypt. The Pals served defending Suez until the first week in March 1916 when they sailed for Marseilles and the train north to the trenches of the Western Front. During his stay in Port Said William was charged with drunkenness and sentenced to two weeks Field Punishment No.1.
He was promoted to Lance Corporal in the wake of the 13th November offensive on the Somme that claimed the lives of so many of the originals.
William Robert Chapman was killed in action on 8th March 1917 and is buried in Euston Road Cemetery; he was 29 years old.
