Knee, George Creasey

KNEE,

GEORGE CREASEY

BORN 6 SEPTEMBER 1882

George Creasey Knee was

born 16 September 1882, in Peckham, Surrey, son of Henry Knee (b 1855 in Lacock, Wiltshire) and Mary Rebecca Knee (née Creasey, b 1858 in Kent).

George’s parents were married in 1881, in Camberwell, London. They had four children, George, Isabelle (b 1886 in Bristol), Daisy (b 1891 in Bristol) and Henry (b 1898 in Bristol).

George entered the School on 19 September 1893, aged 11, at which time his father Henry was a Baptist Minister and the family lived at Wellington House, 5, Ashely Road, Bristol. He left School in July 1896, aged 13.

In 1911 the census records show George living 44 Park Road Hull, Sculcoates, Yorkshire and working as a Solicitor and in the same year he married Alice Mellows (b 1884 in Peterborough). In November 1914, he joined the East Yorkshire Regiment, 4th Battalion. By April 1915, he was a Captain attached to the 8th Battalion in France.

At dawn on the 9th April 1917, thousands of troops emerged from the tunnels beneath the town. Canadians headed north to take the infamous Vimy Ridge, the British headed east towards Cambrai.

The first days of the battle saw some of the greatest advances of any campaign, however, advantage was soon lost and the battle became, by rate of casualties for each day of the action, the bloodiest of the whole war.

He was killed in action, by a shell, on 3 May 1917, aged 35, in North West France, at Monchy-le-Preux. He is remembered with Honour at the Vis-en-Artois British Cemetery, Haucourt, (Grave Reference VD 23) He was survived by his wife Alice.

His name is also recorded on the The Ring of Remembrance memorial in Notre-Dame-de-Lorette near Arras.

This elliptical memorial, inaugurated in 2014, honours 576,606 soldiers of forty different nationalities who died at Nord-Pas-de-Calais in WWI.

Fifth Panel 47

CONT. KNEE, GEORGE CREASEY

BORN 6 SEPTEMBER 1882

Fifth Panel 48