BORN HULL 1894. A HULL PAL. SON OF JOHN & ADA BLACKMORE. ENGAGED TO ANNIE WILLIAMSON AT TIME OF DEATH. HIS NAME IS ONE OF 46 EMPLOYEES LISTED ON HULL’S “IDEAL BOILERS AND RADIATOR WW1 ROLL OF HONOUR”, NATIONAL AVENUE, HULL. HIS DEATH WAS REPORTED IN THE HDM ON 27/08/1915. *
Hull Pals Memorial Post. PRIVATE JOHN BLACKMORE 13/1407. Born in July 1894, John was the eldest of two sons to John and Ada Blackmore of 28 Naburn Street, Hessle Road, Hull. He enlisted at Hull City Hall on 7th April 1915 joining the 13th Battalion East Yorkshire Regiment, 4th Hull Pals, otherwise known as “T’Others”. A veteran of Egypt, the Somme and Oppy Wood John made Lance Corporal, but was demoted after he went AWOL in late 1917. He was captured and transported under guard to Southampton for trial. It is as likely as not that John had simply seen too much and was suffering from PTSD, but the army in its great wisdom chose to sentence him to the worst punishment possible for his ‘crime’- it sent him back to the war. Joining the 11th Battalion on his arrival back in France he was killed in action five weeks later when the Pals were pushed up to meet the onslaught of the German Spring Offensive on 25th March 1918; his body was never recovered and his name is commemorated on the Arras Memorial to the missing; he was 23 years old. For the romantics out there John was engaged to be married to Annie Williamson and among the possessions returned to his father- a pocket book, postcards, razors- was a lock of her hair.
