Sidney Henry Lowry was born in Stevenage on 8 June 1888. He was educated at Charterhouse School and Pembroke College, Cambridge. In civilian life, he was a member of the London Stock Exchange and a partner in Lowry Brothers, his father’s business. On the outbreak of war he enlisted into the Inns of Court Officer Training Corps and subsequently commissioned into the Hertfordshire Regiment in October 1914. He arrived at 1/1st battalion on the Western Front in February 1915 and by the summer of 1917 had been promoted to rank of Captain having been appointed as Officer Commanding No.2 Company. On 31 July 1917 his battalion was involved in the opening day of the Third Battle of Ypres. They assaulted the Green Line position, a heavily defended objective near St Julien. The attack, conducted in some of the most unfavourable conditions imaginable, ended in failure against sustained counterattacks. In a few short hours, twenty officers and 459 soldiers of 1/1st Herts had become casualties. Among the fallen was Lowry, who killed soon after the battalion crossed the Steenbeek stream. His body was never identified. A brother officer wrote to his parents, stating ‘Your son was killed in action, whilst gallantly leading his company against the final objective... It is not only as a splendid officer but as a friend that we, who had the privilege of knowing him intimately, will always remember him.’

Alexander Edmund