Corporal Walter Kirk MM

My article in this week’s Cornish Guardian seeks help in finding out more about Walter Kirk MM. It is as follows:

In the research that we have been carrying out to mark the centenary of the First World War in St Enoder Parish, we have uncovered a lot of information about some servicemen but with others there are still many questions to be answered.

In my column this week, I would like to share what we have found out about Corporal Walter Kirk, in the hope that someone will have additional information that would be helpful to our project.

Walter was resident in the Summercourt area when he enlisted in the 10th Battalion of the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry. A Londoner, he was born in 1898 at 25 Lenthorp Road in Greenwich and had a very difficult upbringing. His father, also called Walter, originally came from Exeter while his mother, Mary Ann (nee Phillips), was born in London. They had two other sons and Walter senior worked as a general labourer on the docks, but died in 1900.

His widow remarried in 1902 and with her new husband Thomas Simmons, Mary Ann had four daughters. The family continued to live close to the Thames, but historical records show that Walter and his siblings spent much of their childhoods in institutions. It is known that in 1909 most family members were in the Greenwich Union Workhouse and in the following year Walter’s mother died.

At the time of the 1911 census, Walter himself was in Greenwich and Deptford Children’s Home along with two siblings, one was in a Receiving Home for Children in Shepherds Bush, while others were still in the Greenwich Union Workhouse.

It has not been possible to ascertain how Walter Kirk came to be living in Mid Cornwall and there is also a lack of information about key aspects of his military service.

Walter rose to the rank of Corporal and won a Military Medal which was announced in The London Gazette on 12th March 1918, when his place of residence was recorded as Leyton in London. But there is no further information on his act of bravery.

Walter was not killed in action and records show that Walter died on 9th June 1918, though the cause is not documented.

He is one of 8,348 Commonwealth servicemen buried in the St. Sever Cemetery Extension at Rouen, where there were a number of hospitals which would have treated wounded and ill servicemen.

It would be great if anyone had more information about Walter, or indeed any of the men from Fraddon, Indian Queens, St Columb Road and Summercourt who lost their lives in the First World War.