Sergeant Raymond Drew (Royal Fusiliers)

Raymond Drew has been killed in an action that was not intended. He was in the trenches between Givency and Souchez near Vimy Ridge.

On May 23^rd his Battalion was due to attack, along with the Battalions to their left and right. The attack was then cancelled and re-scheduled. However, this attack was also cancelled, as one of the flanking Battalions  was unable to advance, due to a heavy German barrage.

It appears that the message did not reach Raymond’s Company, which advanced and took the German trench, remaining in it for an hour and half until recalled.  It is likely that Raymond was one of the seven members of this Company killed in the attack.

Raymond came from an academic background, as his father was an assistant master at Eton College. He attended the OPS from 1893 till 1897 and won a Classical Scholarship to Rossall.  Thereafter he worked for the Bombay Burmah Trading Corporation.

In 1914 he returned from India to join up as a private soldier in the 22nd (Kensington) Battalion, Royal Fusiliers, and was subsequently promoted to the rank of sergeant.