CAPTAIN PERCY POOL HARRISON
SHERWOOD FORESTERS NOTTS AND DERBY REGIMENT
20TH OCTOBER 1917 AGE 23
BURIED: ST SEVER CEMETERY, ROUEN, FRANCE
Our image of an officer during the First World War can be so wrong. Percy Harrison was obviously an exceptionally able young man: he joined the army as a private in July 1915, was gazetted second lieutenant in the Sherwood Foresters in October 1915 and promoted captain in July 1917. But he did not come from the usual privileged background we associate with officers: his father was a stereotyper at a printing works in Derby and number 52 Dairy House Street was a red-brick terraced house in the Rose Hill district.
Harrison served with the 2nd/5th Battalion the Sherwood Foresters. In April 1916 it was sent to Ireland to quell the rebellion and then in February 1917 to France. He was severely wounded, the report says "received multiple wounds", on 26 September 1917 in the Sherwood Forester's attack on Otto Farm during the early stages of the Battle of Polygon Wood. Harrison died three weeks later in No. 2 Red Cross Hospital, Rouen.
Percy Harrison's inscription is nothing more than factual but it speaks of a world of total loss for his parents.