LIEUTENANT CHRISTIAN CRESSWELL CARVER
ROYAL FIELD ARTILLERY
23RD JULY 1917 AGE 20
BURIED: LIJSSENTHOEK MILITARY CEMETERY, BELGIUM
Christian Carver's inscription comes from the service of Evensong in the Book of Common Prayer:
"Lighten our darkness we beseech Thee, O Lord, and by Thy great mercy, defend us from all perils and dangers of this night."
The prayer is not just that God will literally defend us from the perils of the dark but that He may shine a light into the dark night of our souls, when we are in despair.
Christian Carver left school, Rugby, in 1914 and went straight to the RMA, Woolwich. Commissioned into the Royal Field Artillery in April 1915, he went to France that June when he was still only 18. He served there and in Flanders for the next two years. On 23 July 1917 his dug out received a direct hit. His men dug him out and got him away to hospital as quickly as possible but he had been badly wounded. A friend immediately wrote to Carver's mother, telling her: "I have just left him in an ambulance, and he was conscious and has every chance of pulling through. He was hit in the top of the leg." But Carver died that night.
A memorial book Christian Cresswell Carver, consisting of Carver's letters, and of letters of condolence sent to his parents, was printed for private circulation in 1920. The book has been digitised by the Bodleian Library.