BROOKES, Arnold

Arnold Brookes was the son of Joseph and Lucy Jane Brookes, of 11 Bowling Green Road, Stourbridge. He volunteered for the Warwicks and joined the 16th (3rd Birmingham Pals) Battalion, serving in A Company, No. 1 Platoon. They moved to France at the end of 1915 and were ordered to a quiet sector of the Western Front on the Somme. Sniping and shelling, however, were frequent and deaths occurred in the trenches. On the 15th January 1916 one of these was Private Arnold Brookes. He was 20 years of age and is buried at Citadel New Military Cemetery, Fricourt (III C 8) and commemorated on the Lye and Wollescote and Lye church Memorials.