Charles Henry Anderson AM

b. 1890 North Stoke, Wallingford, Oxfordshire.  d. 29/11/1916 France.

DATE OF AM ACTION: 28/11/1916 France.

Charles H Anderson AM

Charles was born in North Stoke, Oxfordshire, one of four children of Charles and Lizzie Anderson (nee Barnshaw). His siblings were Lily Olive, Dora Mary and Bertie George Glover. His brother would be killed on the first day of the Battle of the Somme on 1st July 1916. Sadly, just four months later, Charles would die of the wounds received in his AM action. His AM was presented to his mother Lizzie Anderson by the GOC Southern Command at Bradfield College on 20th July 1917.

 

AM CITATION:

On the 28th November, 1916, Lance Corporal Anderson was in a hut in France with eleven other men when, accidentally, the safety pin was withdrawn from a bomb. In the semidarkness he shouted a warning to the men, rushed to the door, and endeavoured to open it so as to throw the bomb into a field. Failing to do this, when he judged that the five seconds during which the fuse was timed to burn had elapsed, he held the bomb as close to his body as possible with both hands in order to screen the other men in the hut. Anderson himself and one other man were mortally wounded by the explosion, and five men were injured. The remaining five escaped unhurt. Anderson sacrificed his life to save his comrades.

 

BURIAL LOCATION: ST VENANT COMMUNAL CEMETERY, FRANCE.

PLOT II ROW K GRAVE 3.

LOCATION OF MEDAL: UNKNOWN.

Acknowledgement:

Mick McCann – Image of the Anderson AM Grave.