William Henry Parsons

Age 21        Single

Corporal 17253
8^th Bn., East Lancashire Regiment

Killed in action on
Friday 21^st July 1916

William resided with his parents at Whalley Road, Sabden.  As a child he regularly attended the Wesleyan Chapel and Sunday School.  On leaving school he began work as an assistant at the Co-operative Stores.  

At the outbreak of the war, William at once enlisted into the army and after a short period of training in England, his regiment went out to France.  William wrote home to his parents daily. After the letters stopped and his parents had heard nothing for five weeks, they placed an appeal in the Burnley Express on the 2^nd September 1916 asking if anybody had any news of their son.  Later that week the anxious parents were shown a letter that had been received in Burnley by the parents of Lance Corporal Jack Schofield, a pal of Williams, in this he said  

“I told you that Parsons has got a nice ‘blighty’, but he has not been heard of since, and the idea was that he must have been caught by a shell while going down to the dressing station.”

Mr and Mrs Parsons received official news of William's death two weeks later. 

William's body was never recovered and he is remembered on the Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France.

 In Sabden he has been remembered on the School Plaque.