TOPIC:

Jack Eaton came from a relatively lower middle class background - his father was a Clerk at the local Colliery where he, in turn, was a Labourer. What induced him to journey to South Africa we will never know but it's where he "laid his hat" only perish in the cause of freedom in 1917.

Jack Eaton

Killed in Action – 21 April 1917

Trooper, Kimberley Light Horse & Army Service Corps – Anglo Boer War
Acting Bombardier, 75th Siege Battery, South African Heavy Artillery, WWI

- Queens South Africa Medal with clasps Transvaal and Defence of Kimberley to 83 Tpr. J. Eaton, Kimberley Lt. Horse
- British War Medal to Gunner J. Eaton, S.A.H.A.

Jack Eaton, or John to give him his correct name, was born in Swadlincote, Derbyshire in 1871 the son of John Eaton, a Clerk at a nearby Colliery, and his wife Annie.

The 1881 England census was the first opportunity for Jack to make his appearance. At the age of 10 he was a school boy attending the Swadlincote Parish School in an ever increasing family. Along with his parents were older sister Emma (12) and other siblings George J (7), Fred A (6), Sarah A (4) and Harry (1) all living in Church Street, Wideshaft, Swadlincote.

Ten years later, at the time of the 1891 census the family were still in the same location the only obvious change in their lives being the addition of a number of children. The intervening ten years were kind to the Eaton family with Maud (7), Christopher Anthony (6) and Ethel (3) having joined the ranks. Jack now 20 was employed as a Labourer at probably the same Colliery where his father earned his living.

Quite when Jack Eaton decided that the cramped confines of home was too much for him we don’t know but, at some point in the 1890’s he trekked south to South Africa where he sought work on the Diamond Fields of Kimberley. Kimberley at the turn of the 20th Century was a hive of activity with Cecil John Rhodes and other magnates reigning supreme over the mines and the diamond works there. Like any boom town Kimberley attracted its fair share of speculators and people who were associated with the mining industry.

War broke out between Great Britain and the two Boer Republics at the tip of the African continent in October 1899 and soon spread in the direction of Kimberley, a town targeted by the Boer leaders as a bastion of the Empire and one which simply had to be taken by their forces. Plus the hated Rhodes was known to be within its confines and capturing him would really set the cat among the pigeons! The investiture of Kimberley lasted 123 days from the 14th October 1899 until the town was relieved by French and it was left to the inhabitants to withstand any attacks that were made by the Boers who had surrounded the area.

Very few Imperial troops were garrisoned there and the defenders came from the Town Guard and other hastily raised units in the main. One such was the Kimberley Light Horse with whom Eaton enlisted on 2 November 1899 with no. 83. It was to these mounted men that Kimberley looked to take the fight to the Boers and this they did on a number of occasions often incurring substantial losses in the process. The Boers were comfortably ensconced on the high-lying ground outside the town and were content to lob any number of shells in a desultory fashion into the heart of Kimberley, hoping no doubt, to throw the locals into a panic thus enforcing their surrender. This never happened and, as mentioned Kimberley was relieved after four months.

The Siege over Eaton and the K.L.H. took the fight across the nearby border into the Orange Free State which is where he earned this clasp in addition to the Defence of Kimberley one to his Queens Medal. The immediate threat over, he next saw service with the Army Service Corps as a Conductor before reverting back to a purely civilian role. Returning to the United Kingdom, the shipping manifests show that he made his way back to South Africa aboard the S.S. “Miltiades” on 8 November 1905. Now 32 years of age when he disembarked at Cape Town he was described as a Miner.

Very little is known of Eaton’s actions until the Great War broke out in 1914. Initially South Africa was slow to enter the war effort but Eaton was there when it mattered. On 23 November he joined the South African Heavy Artillery (Cape Province Regiment) listing as his next of kin a friend, Mr. W.C.A. Brown of the Unionist Party Club in McIntyre Street, Jeppestown, Johannesburg. Despite serving with them until 15 February 1915 he was never deployed and thus wasn’t eligible for the 1914/15 Star awarded to those that went to German South West Africa.

On 23 August 1915 Eaton completed the Attestation Papers “For Period of German War and Six Months Later if Required” at Cape Town. Joining the South African Heavy Artillery with the rank of Gunner and no. 595 he was now 38 years old and confirmed that he was a Miner by occupation and that he had prior service with the Kimberley Light Horse, the Army Service Corps, Transport and the S.A.S.C. (South African Service Corps)

Described physically as being 5 feet 9 ½ inches in height he had a fair complexion, grey eyes and fair hair with a scar on his left shin. Having sailed for England he was initially mustered as a Master Cook the duties of which he performed until 30 December 1915. Whilst a Cook he was on a Professional rate of pay receiving an additional 6d per day. On 5 November 1915 he was promoted to the rank of Acting Bombardier and, on 23 April 1916 he sailed from Southampton disembarking at Havre in France the next day and making his way to the front where he was employed in the field with the 75th Siege (Natal) Battery of the S.A.H.A.

On 16 October he blotted what was otherwise an unblemished copybook when he was arrested drunk in the city of Amiens at 8.30 in the evening. For this he was awarded 14 days Field Punishment. We pick up the details of how the Battery was engaged from their War Diary and particularly the section that dealt with the German retreat to the Hindenburg Line in 1917:

The battery moved to Assevillers on 19 March and preparations were made for following up the enemy. The advance commenced on 25 March, the Somme being crossed at Peronne for the first time by 26 cwt. Howitzers, a pontoon bridge being used as all the permanent ones had been destroyed. The guns were parked near Doingt Wood and the battery was attached to the 48th Division. The right section moved forward on 28 March and came into action at Templeaux-La-Foss the next day in support of the infantry attack on St. Emillie. The right section went forward again on 2 April to Longaveshes and was joined by the left section from Doingt Wood on 3 April.

The attack on Lempire and Ronnsoy was supported from this position. On the 8th April the first shots were fired at the Hindenburg Line. On 21 April a chateau which had been occupied by the gun crews, but which had been under suspicion and evacuated, blew up, having been mined by the Germans with a delay action mine of the chemical type (the detonator is exploded by a spring held in position by a wire which passes through a small chamber containing an acid which eventually eats the wire through and thus releases the spring). Two men were killed and 6 injured who were sleeping in the immediate vicinity, but under the circumstances it was fortunate that there were not more casualties.

Two men were killed... one of them was a young chap from Cape Town, Gunner N.C. Jefferies the other was Jack Eaton. For Eaton the war had ended in the worst possible way. His grave is near the Chateau Chapel, St. Milie, 1 mile north east of Villers Faucon.

Jack Eaton had survived the perils of a Siege only to succumb to a German mine 15 years later.