CLASPER, Edward

Edward Clasper lived at 21 Enville Street, Stourbridge, and was the first son of Richard and Sophia Clasper to die in the Great War. He was a married man with four children and had worked as a retort builder for Messrs. E.J. and J. Pearson at the Delph. He enlisted on the 30th June 1915 and joined the 9th (Service) Battalion of the Worcesters. This battalion was sent to Gallipoli in July 1915 and landed at Suvla Bay on the 6th August. It moved to Mesopotamia in 1916 in another attempt to defeat the Turkish forces and Edward Clasper joined them in June 1916. In the hot summer there was little action, but a major attack was planned to advance up the Tigris and take Kut, where a small British force had been obliged to surrender in April. The attack on Kut took place on the 25th January 1917, but there were heavy casualties. Edward Clasper was made prisoner and sent back to Raselin in Turkey. Here he died on the 5th May of typhoid fever. Private Edward Clasper was 38 years of age and is commemorated on the Basra, Stourbridge and St. Thomas's church Memorials and on his parents' grave in Amblecote churchyard.