Nuneaton &
North Warwickshire
Family History Society
The friendly family history society for all of North Warwickshire
The friendly family history society for all of North Warwickshire
1st (Western Ontario) Battalion, Canadian Infantry
Killed in action in the Battle of Gravenstafel Ridge, France and Flanders, 22nd* April 1915, age 28
Commemorated Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium. Ref: Panels 10, 26 and 28
Awarded 1915 British War and Victory medals
Son of George and Caroline Iliffe, Newdegate Square, Nuneaton
Links to Relevant Information
1st Battalion Canadian Infantry
Sarnia Historical Society Articles. In Memoriam | Memorial Plaque
Other Information
Born on 6th July 1886 and baptised on 3rd October 1886 in Nuneaton (St Nicholas Church parish register on Find My Past)
Attended King Edward VI Grammar School
Played rugby for Nuneaton and Nuneaton Old Edwardians
1891 census living 29 Market Place, Nuneaton with his parents and siblings. His father was a chemist.
1901 census living 29 Market Place, Nuneaton with his parents and siblings. His father was a chemist.
1911 census living 29 Market Place, Nuneaton, with his widowed father and siblings. He was employed as a bank clerk.
29th May 1913 Passenger lists show a Mr R S Iliffe arriving in Montreal, Canada on the White Star Dominion ship ‘Laurentic’. Listed as 26 years old, a merchant, travelling alone (Find My Past)
1914 living in Sarnia, Canada and enlisted 22nd September 1914, Valcartier, Quebec
12th May 1915, Birmingham Mail newspaper report states Roy died in action, and he was a prominent rugby footballer. It also states his late father, George was a famous old Nuneaton cricketer.
14th May 1915, death reported in the Nuneaton Observer
Probate dated 6th December 1915, to Gwedolen Mary Iliffe (his older sister). (*probate says he died 30th April 1915, CWGC says 22nd April 1915)
During the Battle of Gravenstafel Ridge (2nd Battle of Ypres) the German forces released some 168 tons of chlorine gas over a four-mile mile front which fell mainly in the trenches of French and French Colonial forces of the 45th and 87th Divisions. The gas caused massive casualties and created a four-mile gap in the front line. Canadian troops defended the flank of the subsequent break-in by the Germans; they had urinated into cloth which they held to their faces to fight the effects of the gas. Other reports make it clear that Pte Iliffe could have been one of the Canadian soldiers killed by the effects of chlorine gas. There were unofficial reports that his body was buried on the banks of the Ypres Canal.