Private 17256 Samuel Ellison WILDE
20th Battalion, Manchester Regiment
Killed in Action, Saturday 1st July 1916, France, Age 20
Home address:
2a Milk Street, Hyde, Cheshire
Born:
1896, Hyde, Cheshire
Parents:
Catherine Wilde and Samuel Wilde
Ellison House, Styal Road, Wilmslow, Cheshire
Marital Status:
Single
Occupation:
Worked for his father, a Bank Manager, at Parr's Bank,York Street, Manchester.
Enlisted:
Manchester, Lancashire
Remembered:
Dantzig Alley British Cemetery, Mametz, Somme, France, plot V, row J, grave 7.
Link to Hyde:
Born in Hyde
Part of a letter received by Wilde’s parents from his commanding officer:
How sorry we all were to lose him because of his wonderfully cheerful disposition. Wherever we were he was always the same; nothing in the way of hardships, rough weather, or shortages of food in the trenches affected his spirits in the least, and a disposition of that sort, combined with a spirit which made him always volunteer for any extra hard or dangerous work had an incalculable effect on the spirits of the whole section. It speaks volumes when I tell you that your son was known to everyone, not as Private Wilde, but as "Sammy".
See on a display in the Natwest Bank, Market Street, Manchester, October 2018:
Although young in years his smiling open countenance, his unruffled disposition and his remarkable cheerfulness have won for him great respect, and have left an impression on his colleagues at York Street Office which will not easily be erased. – From an obituary in Parr’s Bank Staff Magazine.