A Kirklees church has remembered the two sons of a former vicar who were killed in the Battle of the Somme.
The Rev T D Hyde, vicar of Whitechapel Church in Cleckheaton between 1893 and 1926, lost Charles and Eustace.
Lt Eustace Emile Hyde was killed in action October 12, 1916, age 23 while serving with the 4th Royal Irish Fusiliers and is buried about a mile from where he fell.
He was shot dead by German machine gun fire on the enemy parapet while gallantly leading his platoon into action at Lesboeufs. The fire was so intense that his comrades could not recover his body.
2nd Lt Charles Stewart Hyde, 16th West Yorkshire Regiment (1st Bradford Pals), was killed in action on the opening day of the battle, July 1, 1916, aged 25 and is listed on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing. His body was never found.
July 1 was the blackest day in British military history when 20,000 men were killed and another 37,000 wounded, mostly within minutes of leaving their trenches.
The Bradford and Leeds Pals were almost completely annihilated in front of the fortified village of Serre at the north of the Somme battlefield.
A letter to the family from a colleague states that 2nd Lt Hyde was leading his platoon over the top but he was wounded in the arm and leg before he had gone 100 yards.
He refused to go back, stating that “he would see the job through.” Eventually his leg was bound and he was dragged to a shellhole but while sitting there with two other wounded soldiers, encouraging his men, a shell exploded, killing them all instantly. What was left of his body was never found.
Both brothers lived at Whitechapel Church vicarage in Cleckheaton and a stained-glass window in their memory was installed in Whitechapel Church at the end of the war, paid for by subscriptions from the parishioners.
