First World War in Headington & Marston
Roll of Honour of St Andrew’s Church, Old Headington

John Percival Curtis ASHWORTH (1891–1917)

 

John Percival Curtis Ashworth was born in 1891 in Hatfield, Herefordshire, the eldest son of Henry Ashworth Ashworth (born at Iffley on 22 September 1854 and baptised there on 28 October 1854) and Helen Alexandra Chester-Master (born in Almondsbury, Gloucestershire in 1862/3, registered in first quarter of 1863 as Helen Alexandra Master and baptised at Almondsbury on 10 March 1863).

John’s father’s family had a strong Oxford connection. His grandfather, John Ashworth Ashworth (son of Philip Howard Ashworth, gentleman) had been a Fellow of Brasenose College until his marriage to Catherine Walsh at Iffley on 8 July 1851, whereupon he was appointed Vicar of Didcot. Their son Henry Ashworth Ashworth (John’s father, born in Iffley and baptised there by his own father on 28 October 1854) was matriculated at the University of Oxford from University College on 11 October 1873 at the age of 19 but did not collect his B.A. until 1880. In the census the following spring, when he was 26, he was working as an auctioneer and land agent in Lancashire, boarding in a lodging house at 23 Park Street, Lytham.

John’s parents were married in Caynham, Shropshire on 9 September 1890, and they eight children:

• John Percival Curtis Ashworth (born in Hatfield, Herefordshire on 28 November 1891)
• Rupert Henry William Ashworth (born in Hatfield, Herefordshire on 13 November 1892)
• Bryan Gerald Ashworth (born in 1893/4, registered Leominster first quarter: death registered there first quarter of 1898)
• Ferdinand Ashworth (born in Bodenham, Herefordshire in 1895, registered Leominster second quarter)
• Madeline Helen Ashworth (born in Bodenham, Herefordshire in 1897, registered Leominster third quarter)
• Richard Arthur Ashworth (born in Bodenham, Herefordshire in 1902, registered Leominster third quarter)
• William Howard Ashworth (born in Bodenham, Herefordshire in 1903, registered Leominster third quarter)
• Percival Gerald Ashworth, known as Gerald (born in Bodenham, Herefordshire in 1905).

John’s father was a land agent. At the time of the 1891 census he and his wife Helen were staying with her widower father, the Dublin-born retired Colonel William Charles Chester-Master, who lived at Hampton Park House, Hampton Court, Hope-under-Dinmore, Leominster with his two unmarried daughters Ariana (29) and Madeline (27). Helen’s mother, Madeline Harriet Louisa Chester-Master, had died at the age of 53 just over a year earlier (death registered under surname Master in the fourth quarter of 1889).

By the time of John’s birth in September 1891, his parents were living in Herefordshire, at Bodenham near Leominster.

In the 1901 census, when John was nine years old, the family can be seen living at Hill House in Bodenham with three servants: a cook, parlourmaid, and nurse. John was sent away to school in Somerset: first to Walton Lodge Prep School at Cleveden, and then in 1906 to the King’s School, Bruton.

In 1908, the year that John left school, his father died in Gloucestershire (registered Chipping Sodbury district fourth quarter). About eighteen months later at the age of 18 John sailed to Australia on the Opher, which reached Brisbane on 9 May 1910. He went on to Wairarapa in New Zealand, where he worked on a large sheep ranch for five years. His probate record supplies his address: Glenburn, Hinarura, Wairarapa.

At the time of the 1911 census Mrs Helen Ashworth was still living at Hill House in Bodenham with her sons Ferdinand (16), William (7), and (Percival) Gerald (6), as well has her niece Nina M. Ferguson (17); the family had a cook and a housemaid. Four of her children were away from home: John himself would obviously have been in New Zealand; Rupert (18) was boarding at The King’s School, Bruton; Madeline (13) was staying with her uncle, the Revd Edwin Augustus Ferguson, in the Vicarage at Shalford, Surrey; and Richard (8) was at a prep school called St Catherine’s at Barton on Sea, New Milton, Hampshire.

In March 1915 John returned to the UK from New Zealand to enlist in the army.

Around the time the First World War started, John’s mother, Mrs Helen Alexandra Ashworth, moved to Old Headington: she is listed in Kelly’s Directory for 1915/16 and 1916/17 as living at “The Hostel” at 3 St Andrew’s Road (above). This was a boarding house before Mrs Ashworth moved in, and although she retained its name, it seems very unlikely that she used it in this way.

In the First World War John Percival Curtis Ashworth was gazetted as a Second Lieutenant in the 3rd Battalion of the Suffolk Regiment on 9 July 1915, and was mentioned in despatches in January 1917. Early in that year he was gazetted temporary Lieutenant in the 7th Battalion, and was killed in action on 28 April 1917 at the age of 25 at Monchy in France in the Battle of Arleux (the second phase of the Battle of Arras).

Ashworth was posthumously awarded the Military Cross for the following action:

When the advance of his Battalion was held up, Lieutenant Ashworth made a reconnaissance under very heavy fire and returned with most valuable information. He showed great coolness and initiative throughout the action.

The notice of his death in The Times of 9 May 1917 reads:

ASHWORTH.-- Killed in action, on the 28th April, 1917, Lieutenant John Percival Ashworth, Suffolk Regt., dearly-loved eldest son of the late Henry A. Ashworth and Helen A. Ashworth, of The Hostel, Headington, Oxford, in his 26th year.

Ashworth never married, and administration was granted in London to his widowed mother, Helen Alexandra Ashworth, on 18 September 1917. He left £505 2s. 6d.

Ashworth has no known grave. He is remembered on the Arras Memorial (Bay 4); on a plaque in the chancel of Bodenham church; on a plaque in the Memorial Hall of the King’s School, Bruton; and on the roll of honour in St Andrew’s Church, Old Headington.

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Tributes to John Percival Curtis Ashworth

The Dolphin, his school magazine:

His death will cause real grief to all his many friends. It is difficult to recall any member of the School who won more universal popularity, in spite of the fact that he never took a very leading position either in work or in athletics. He had a personal charm and magnetism which made him loved for what he was rather than for what he did. Endowed as he was by nature with a singularly prepossessing exterior, his outward attractions were only an indication of an equally beautiful personality. He had a rare simplicity of character, and an unselfishness and a consideration for others seldom met with at so early an age: while his buoyant spirits, which insisted on seeing the humorous side of every situation, will never be forgotten by his old schoolfellows.

His Colonel:

I had known John since Oct. 15th [1916], and was very fond of him: he was such a cheery, good fellow, as well as a brave and capable officer. Only a few days ago I sent in his name for a Military Cross. He was absolutely fearless, and always perfectly cool under heavy fire.

Lieutenant J. Hearn:

After the push of April 9th [1917], John brought in a German machine gun and mounting. You ought to have seen the pride with which he showed me the gun a day or two later. I pointed out to him jokingly that it was incomplete, the breech block being missing. What do you think he did? He went back to Fenchy Chapel, where the gun was captured, and where heavy fighting was still in progress, and fetched the breech block. That was John!’

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Postscript

John’s mother

• Mrs Helen Alexandra Ashworth was living at Buckland, near Frome, Somerset just after the war. She died at Ringwood in Hampshire on 18 February 1953 at the age of 90.

John’s siblings

• Rupert Henry William Ashworth (born 1892) sailed to Australia in 1912 and went on to New Zealand, possibly to join his brother John. He fought in Egypt in the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, and returned to farming in New Zealand after the war, marrying there in 1924.
• Richard Arthur Ashworth (born 1902) married Isobel Holmes in 1934 and they had two children: Simon Holmes Ashworth (born 1935) and Rupert Stephen Holmes Ashworth (born 1937, died November 1979). Richard Arthur Ashworth died on 17 September 1986.
• William Howard Ashworth (born 1903) married Joan Parkes in 1945.
• Percival Gerald Ashworth (born 1905) married Patricia Garnett in 1930.