CHARLES DAVID DOLLERY
Both of the parents of Charles David were born in the vicinity of Hambledon, a few miles north of Portsmouth, but they moved south in the early 1880s. Charles David himself spent the whole of his life prior to the Great War in Portsmouth.
His father was Henry Dollery who was born in 1854 and although the census records from 1891 onwards give his wife's name as Rebecca (or Rebekah) there seems to be no record of their marriage. The only person named in the marriage records for the relevant period and called Henry Dollery married a woman named Ellen Pratt in 1881 in the district of Droxford which would cover Hambledon. Perhaps Ellen changed her preferred name to Rebecca.
The 1891 census recorded Henry and Rebecca at Ashford Cottage, by Hill Lane Terrace in the Milton/Eastney area. With them were their first four children Harry (b. 1883), Charles David (b. 1885), Leonard (b. 1888) and Maurice (b. 1891). Henry was working as a bricklayer's labourer and Charles David as a bricklayer's apprentice. The 1901 census saw the family at 24 Reginald Road, Eastney with two more children, Laura (b. 1894) and Cyril (b. 1898).
Although most of the family remained at Reginald Road (no. 47) for the 1911 census Charles David had by then married Ellen Teresa Fitzgerald, a native of Limerick in Ireland and set up home with her at 150 Eastfield Road, Eastney, just round the corner from his parents. The census also records their four children, Eddie (b. 1906), Greta (b. 1908), Harry (b. 1909) and Gerald (b. 1910). By then also, Charles David had left his apprenticeship behind and become a fully-fledged bricklayer.
At the outbreak of the Great War Charles David was a 29 year old married man with a growing family so there would have been little pressure for him to enlist. However in January 1916 conscription was introduced and he would have had no choice in the matter. When he did join up he was posted to the Middlesex Regiment, probably to make up numbers lost in battle. With them he would have seen action at the Battle of the Somme, the Arras Offensive and the Third Battle of Ypres. He lost his life in December 1917.
FURTHER INFORMATION
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) list C Dollery, Corporal (238055), 18th Battalion, Middlesex Regiment, died 21/12/1917, age 33. Buried at Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery (Grave Ref: XXVII.C.11A.). Son of Mr. and Mrs. Dollery, of 47, Reginald Rd., Portsmouth; husband of C. T. Dollery, of 149, Eastfield Rd., East Southsea, Portsmouth.
Charles Dollery is commemorated on the Cenotaph, Guildhall Square, Portsmouth. He is not listed in "The National Roll of the Great War", Section X.
RESEARCH NOTES
The CWGC record gives Charles David's wife's name as "C.T." but this does not accord with any other archival source.
Tim Backhouse
January 2015