Private Reginald Cartwright, 6th Battalion The Green Howards (Yorkshire Regiment)

The Green Howards

Private Reginald Cartwright (No.4862832) was in the 6th Battalion Green Howards (The Yorkshire Regiment) and he died at El Alamein on 26th October 1942. He was 27.

He was the son of Harold Cartwright and Florence (nee Clowes). Florence was the sister of Joseph Clowes who appears on the Great Glen War Memorial in the list of deaths in the Great War.

Green Howards Museum

Reg’s niece, Mrs Jones, says that he joined the Leicestershire Regiment at the outbreak of war and was later transferred to the Green Howards. His sister Audrey remembers the telegram coming saying that he was missing. She has also been to the Green Howards Regimental Museum in Richmond, Yorkshire where his name is listed amongst those killed at El Alamein.

Reg appears in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission records with no initial or Christian name and he also appears on the Great Glen War Memorial with the wrong regiment. He is wrongly shown as a private in the Royal Leicestershire Regiment – a regiment which did not exist until 1946 - and is also not in the alphabetical sequence. It is as though he was added as an afterthought.

Reg Cartwright

The family lived in Oaks Road, near the Methodist Church, until 1936. Reg went to school in Great Glen and later to Kibworth Grammar School. The family left the village and moved into Leicester when Reg’s older sister, Doris May, married Charles Gamble. Reg’s other siblings were Irene, who pre-deceased him, Audrey and Ivis. A week before he went overseas in the Spring of 1942 Reg married Hilda Etheridge at the Church of the Martyrs, Westcotes Drive, Leicester. His sisters Ivis & Audrey were bridesmaids. He never saw her again. She later re-married

The family were all members at Great Glen Methodist Church and still came back for Sunday School Anniversaries and other big events for some years after they moved out.

Italians of the Folgore Division

On 25 October 1942, a couple of days after the 2nd Battle of El Alamein had started, the Green Howards formed up behind the white tape start line, drank a tot of rum and fixed bayonets. At 10.30 p.m. a creeping barrage commenced firing in front of them and the men advanced. The enemy – Italian paratroopers of the Folgore Division - put down heavy mortar and machine-gun fire, but, cheering and with their bayonets at the ready, the Green Howards charged across the minefield and assaulted the enemy machine-gun posts and there was fierce fighting at close quarters.

It seems probable that Reg was killed during this operation.

Alamein Memorial

Reg is commemorated on Column 59 of the Alamein Memorial in Egypt. To find details of how to get to the memorial click on the link to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission web site.