CAPTAIN HENRY EVELYN ARTHUR PLATT
COLDSTREAM GUARDS
15TH MAY 1916 AGE 32
BURIED: BRANDHOECK MILITARY CEMETERY, BELGIUM
This seems rather a half-hearted inscription until you realise that it's a quote from a poem written by Henry Platt himself. By chance, the poem was published in the Eton Chronicle just after he had been killed but before the announcement of his death. The poem makes clear that the writer wouldn't want any elevated language to surround his own death.
"Say not of him 'he left this vale of tears,'
Who loved the good plain English phrase
'He died,'
Nor state he nobly lived (or otherwise),
Failed or succeeded' - friend, just say
"He tried"
Captain Platt was a very popular officer both with his men and his fellow officers. He had been out at the front since August 1914, originally with the 19th Hussars. However, following a series of clashes with a senior officer, he asked for a transfer to the Coldstream Guards. He was killed whilst out wiring on a bright moonlit night.