Addy MC, James Carlton

Hull Pals Memorial Post. CAPTAIN JAMES CARLTON ADDY MC. Born 1890 in Hemsworth, Yorkshire James was the second of three children to James and Mary Addy of ‘Carlton’, Holbeck Hill, Scarborough. Living in Hull when war broke out at ‘Almora’ House, Beverley Road, James enlisted in the 10th Battalion East Yorkshire Regiment and served in Egypt and on the Somme before being killed in action during that fateful attack on Oppy Wood on 3rd May 1917. You may remember the details; the wire had not been cut and the men, under a fierce bombardment, had to funnel in hordes through the small number of gaps which the shelling had created. They were easy prey to machine guns hidden among the trees and the bodies piled high around these bottlenecks causing the living to clamber over their fallen comrades in order to reach their objective. It was total carnage, and the worst day of the war for the Hull Pals. Captain Addy is remembered in a story told by Private Green who was awarded the DCM for single-handedly taking one of the machine gun posts:
“They had stopped firing for a moment and I threw a Mills Bomb which wrecked their gun, killed four men and wounded one, and the others then threw up their hands. Just then Captain JC Addy jumped into the trench and when he saw the prisoners he said, ‘You’d better take them back, Green, you seem to have done your bit for today’.”
From that one mention I get the sense that James was a kind and courageous man respected by his men. He was killed soon after, and his body never recovered. James Carlton Addy is commemorated on the Arras Memorial; he was 26 years old. He left £1,528 in his will to his father James, who was a Colliery Director.