PRIVATE FREDERICK GRINDLEY
KING'S SHROPSHIRE LIGHT INFANTRY
13TH NOVEMBER 1916 AGE 37
BURIED: SERRE ROAD CEMETERY NO. 1, SERRE, FRANCE
Most families observed the conventions in some way or other when choosing a headstone inscription, but not all of them. Frederick Grindley's family didn't. They put, "We loved him dearly" as a simple statement of fact, which is all the more effective for it.
And who were the "we" who loved him dearly? There were his parents, Thomas and Ann, although it's possible that Ann was dead by the time the inscription was chosen, and his three brothers: Joseph, Henry and Arthur. Joseph, his older brother, signed for the inscription.
Frederick was a Lance Corporal in the Shropshire Light Infantry in the 1901 census, and a house painter in Islington in 1911. He enlisted in Birmingham and was mobilised from there on 20 March 1916.
Grindley served with the 7th Battalion the King's Shropshire Light Infantry which took part in the weather-postponed attack at Serre at 5.45 am on 13 November. The attack failed to gain its objective, thwarted by mud, mist, early officer casualties and the strength-in-depth of the enemy.