BORN COTTINGHAM 1891. SON OF GEORGE & JANE STABELER. HE WAS A LABOURER, MARKET GARDENER AND PORK BUTCHER.
SERVED WITH THE 2/1ST EAST RIDING YEOMANRY, IN THE MIDDLE EAST. DIED AT SEA, ON HMS “ARCADIA”, ON 15/04/1917, AGED 26. BURIED AT MIKRA CEMETERY, GREECE.
HIS NAME IS LISTED ON COTTINGHAM WAR MEMORIAL AND ON THE COTTINGHAM METHODIST CHURCH WW1 PLAQUE.
On 15th April 1917, HMT Arcadian was sunk off Melos in the Aegean Sea. Nineteen men of the draft of 43 ERY men destined to join the 1/1st ERY in Palestine were among those drowned. The regiment’s war diary notes 2nd Lt. (Richard Duncan) Ullyott and 13 men arriving on May 9th, with 19 reported drowned. In addition, Robert Bell was a former ERY man, then attached to the Lincolnshire Yeomanry and Harry Matthews may also have been with the ERY, though the evidence is ambiguous. So the total losses for the regiment on this occasion may have been 21. Though there were a couple of experienced NCOs in this group, the majority were young recruits.
