2/Lieut. Arthur Charles Sotheron Estcour, MC

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Military Cross (MC) (Geo.V); 
BWM; AVM (Brit.) 2/Lieut. A.C.S. Estcourt R.A.F.

 

MC LONDON GAZETTE 26 SEPTEMBER 1916
“Temp. 2nd Lt (Temp Lt) Arthur Charles Sotheron Estcourt. Glou. R.
For Conspicuous Gallantry in action. He fought his battery with great effect under very heavy fire during the attack, dispersing many enemy bombing parties. He also knocked out a machine gun which was holding up the advance of one of our bombing parties.”

 

Lieutenant Arthur Charles Sotheron Estcourt age: 24, 5th Sqdn. Royal Air Force; formerly 8th Bn. Gloucestershire Regiment; awarded MC; son of the Rev. E. W. Sotheron-Estcourt, of “Windmill” Milford-on-Sea, Lymington, Hants. Scholar of Magdalene College, Cambridge. 

 

Gazetted September 1916.
Arthur Charles Sotheron Estcourt (26.9.1893) Howson’s 1907 – 1912. Arthur Estcourt died aged 24 on 8 August 1918. 

He was born at Tetbury, Gloucestershire, the son of Rev. Edmund Estcourt and his wife Eleanor, née Bucknall.

 

The 1891 Census records the family of nine living at the Shipton Moyne Rectory, Long Newnton, Wiltshire with six servants.

 

Arthur’s mother died when he was four years old, and the following Census, in 1901, sees him living with his father, his older sister Margaret and his younger brother Walter who also later attended Gresham’s (Howson’s 1907-9).

 

Arthur attended St. Aubyn’s School in Rottingdean, Sussex, before being registered at Howson’s with the award of a Fishmongers’ Scholarship worth £50 per year in May of 1907. 

The young man soon proves his worth, winning prizes for Latin, French and Mathematics. He participated in the debating society, becoming secretary in 1911, and was heard to express some ‘rather pedantic’ views on women’s suffrage during one debate when he declared that, “spending their lives in works of mercy and charity,” the fairer sex should “always lend themselves to the protection of the chivalrous members of the stronger sex for protection.” 

Arthur also played cricket for the School House and achieved the rank of Corporal in the OTC. In 1912 he was involved in the ceremony for laying the foundation stone of the Chapel, having the honour of passing a levelling tool to the Prime Warden to test the evenness of the stone.

 

He left in the Summer of 1912 as a School Prefect, with a Leaving Exhibition, The Gresham Magazine recording that he had been awarded a Mathematical Scholarship to Magdalene College, Cambridge. 

 

Following his older brother Walter to Magdalene, Arthur did not fulfil his early promise at Gresham’s, a note on his academic record reading: 

“Rather lazy. Not a 1st class man – ought not to have had an Exhibition. Slow producer.” He was consequently withdrawn by his father in July of 1914 but returned in October having joined the Cambridge OTC.

 

Like his brother, Arthur was a great supporter of the School after leaving and subscribed to both the Chapel and Old Boys’ Funds. In November 1914 Arthur was commissioned in the Wiltshire Regiment and went to France with them a year later being attached to a battalion of the Gloucestershire Regiment.

 

Early in 1916 he was assigned to a trench mortar battery which he at times commanded and was awarded the Military Cross for ‘conspicuous gallantry’ in July for putting out of action a machine gun and its team which had been holding up the advance of a bombing party. 

In August of that year Arthur was wounded by a sniper’s bullet and was sent home to recover until December. After returning to his battery in 1917 he was severely wounded in August by the premature explosion of a bomb and returned to England again until the end of the year. 

Early in 1918, like many young men at the time, Arthur decided to transfer to the Royal Flying Corps, passing out top of the exam list at the Flying School in April, and going to the front as an observer with 5th Squadron in May.

 

On the morning of 8 August Lieutenant Estcourt was out on patrol over enemy lines. He was found dead later with his pilot Lt. A.D. Robinson, but owing to confusion in the records over his name and rank, a special search was needed to establish his final resting place, in an unmarked grave at Caix, Somme.

 

Arthur’s Squadron Commander wrote that: 
“He was one of my most efficient observers, and was a most popular officer,” saying, “His loss is felt deeply in the Squadron.” http://www.greshamsatwar.co.uk