SECOND LIEUTENANT CLARENCE JOHN LOVELL
ROYAL GARRISON ARTILLERY
19TH OCTOBER 1917 AGE 19
BURIED: YPRES RESERVOIR CEMETERY, BELGIUM
Lines of soldiers don't sweep on any more, whether in triumph or otherwise, that's just not how fighting occurs these days. Nor is it how it occurred during much of the First World War, the soldiers were stuck in trenches and when they tried sweeping out they were usually mown down by machine guns or caught by artillery. Eventually they developed the technique of snatching and holding and it was only at the very end, after 8 August 1918, that any triumphant 'sweeping' could be said to have taken place. By this time Clarence John Lovell had been dead for ten months - one of the heroes who 'stayed' behind.
The inscription sounds as though it's a quotation but it doesn't appear to be. It was composed by Lovell's father, John Charles Lovell, a baker and confectioner in Leamington Spa whose wife, Clement John's mother, is one of the very few women I've come across in my research for this project who also had a job. She was described in the 1911 census as 'manageress confectionary'; I would imagine in her husband's business.
Clement John Lovell, a teacher at Rugby Road School, Leamington was commissioned into the Royal Garrison Artillery in February 1917. He served with the 274th Siege Battery, part of 62nd Brigade. The Warwick and Warwickshire Advertiser announced his death on 27 October 1917, quoting how a fellow officer told his parents: "He was a splendid officer, capable and full of courage, and we feel his loss deeply". As would his parents - Clement John was their only child.