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202236 1st Battalion, London Regiment (Royal Fusiliers)
Attached to 2nd/3rd Battalion
Stanley Watson born around 1896 in Sudbury, one of four children of Charles and Emma Alma Watson. His father was a tailor and the family lived at 43 Melford Road before moving to 1 Queens Terrace in Newton Road. Stanley attended St. Gregory and St. Peter’s School. At the age of 15 he was a draper’s errand boy and later he was a billiard marker at the Conservative Club in Sudbury.
Stanley was living in St. Pancras in London, when he enlisted to serve in the London Regiment (formerly 5145). It is not known when Stanley landed in France or when he was transferred and attached to the 2/3rd Battalion. This battalion had been disbanded in June 1916 and the 3/3rd Battalion had become the new 2/3rd. It formed part of 173rd Brigade, 58th (2/1st London) Division which landed in France at Le Havre in January 1917.
In the spring of 1917 the Division saw action during flanking operations on the Hindenburg Line (20 May - 16 June) in support at the Battle of Arras.
Stanley was reported ‘missing’ and then officially ‘killed in action’ on 16 June 1917 aged 21. There is no known grave and he is remembered on the Arras Memorial, Pas de Calais, France.
Stanley was awarded the British War medal and Victory Medal.
A Cross of Remembrance was laid at the Arras Memorial in March 2007 and October 2011.
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