AGED 17 YEARS
R.I.P.

PRIVATE HUGH AUBREY COCKERTON

CAMBRIDGESHIRE REGIMENT

2ND OCTOBER 1916 AGE 17

BURIED: DOULLENS COMMUNAL CEMETERY EXTENSION NO. 1, TANZANIA


"Sep.10 [To Mrs Sorley]
I am writing on behalf of a gallant youngster in my company, and I believe known to you. His age is I suspect not more than 17 now, and he has been out some while, and though he is an excellent sturdy youngster his nerves are obviously not strong enough for the racket of this existence, which is now-a-days more violent than usual. The point therefore is that his parents or guardian can write and claim him back, by producing a birth certificate, only he himself is apparently entirely in the dark as to who his guardian is - he has of course no parents. So I wonder if you could make representations in the right quarter and collect a copy of his birth certificate and get the thing done: he isn't a fellow I want to lose, but I feel it partakes rather of cruelty to animals to keep him out here just at present."
[Letter from Captain Arthur Innes Adam, Cambridgeshire Regiment, who was killed six days later (16.9.16), see previous epitaph]

The 'gallant youngster', Private Hugh Aubrey Cockerton, died of gas poisoning on 2 October before anything could be done to send him home. His father had died in 1907 and although his mother was still alive, she died four months later in February 1917.
A Miss Cockerton chose his inscription, perhaps one of his several sisters, making sure that from now on there should be no mistake about his age. An elder brother, John Richard William Cockerton, was killed in action on 9 November 1914 and is commemorated on the Le Touret Memorial.