Stephen was a butcher when he volunteered to fight and had literally married the girl next door. Having served in France and coming through many battles Stephen took the Spanish Flu and was returned to Blighty.On his recovery he was posted out to France again and quickly took the flu again.This time like so many before him and so many after it killed him. His wife Alice was chaperoned by a chaplain on a troop ship so that she could see his grave.. Alice was left with a daughter Alice. She later remarried Stephen's friend James Essex and spent the rest of her life in Leyton. Although Stephen died of flu and not from the fighting he was a brave man.As a gunner on the front line he was involved in many battles and saw atrocities we can only imagine. How cruel to come through the war to survive the flu once,to be sent out to France again to die from the flu.

sarah simpson