Private Ernest Wilcox - 16th Battalion Canadian Infantry (12 November 1883 ~ 6 September 1916)

Ernest Wilcox was born on 12 November 1883 in Brixham, Devon, the second son of John Carlisle Wilcox and his wife Louisa Chase who married at All Saints, Brixham on 30 January 1880. Ernest was one of five children; he had an older sister Lucy an older brother Sydney and two younger brothers Samuel and John. Ernest was baptised at All Saints, Brixham on 18 January 1884. Sydney died in 1885 when he was just three years old.Ernest’s father John was a fisherman according to the Census records; he appears on the Merchant Navy list as a boatswain on the Asteria in 1870 from April to August. The last time the family are seen living together is the 1891 Census.

Louisa died in early 1892, aged just 39. Louisa was born on 20 May 1852 to Elizabeth Chase; she was baptised at All Saints on her birthday in 1868. It appears Louisa had not had a blessed life; her mother Elizabeth Saunders Chase was the eldest daughter of John and Sarah Chase (nee Saunders). Records vary about Elizabeth’s birth but according to the 1841 Census she was born in Dartmouth in around 1829 about two years after her parents married in St Petrox, Devon. Louisa appears to have been an only child, though her mother was one of at least nine children. The name Saunders appears on her birth record but not on her baptism. Louisa was living with her grandparents in St Saviour, Totnes in 1861. Elizabeth married John Roberts in 1860, the couple were working as servants in 1871 but sadly John died in 1876. Elizabeth continued to work as a servant for the Highmore family in 1881.

In 1901 after her daughter Louisa’s death, Elizabeth was living with her four grandchildren by which time young Ernest was a school teacher, his brother Samuel an apprentice painter. It is unclear where John was at the time, perhaps away at sea but he appears again on the 1911 Census living with Ernest’s sister Lucy and family including his mother-in-law, Elizabeth. Lucy married a mason and stayed in Brixham; she had one son, Leslie Samuel. Ernest’s grandmother Elizabeth continued to live in Brixham, she died in 1924 at the splendid age of at least 95.

Ernest seems to have emigrated to Canada with his brothers. Records are scanty with regards to his emigration to Canada, but he enlisted into the 72nd Battalion of the Canadian Infantry on 7 October 1915 in Vancouver and served on the Western Front from 19 June 1916 until his death on 6 September 1916. According to his records he had served five years previously with the 1st Devon Royal Garrison Artillery and 18 months with the 91st Regiment in Hamilton Ontario.

He embarked from Halifax, Canada on 23 April 1916 and arrived in Liverpool to join the 16th Battalion on 18 June 1916, arriving in France a day later. 129974 Private Ernest Wilcox died on 6th September 1916 at No 35 Casualty Clearing Station of multiple shrapnel wounds. He is buried at Douellens Community Cemetery Extension No 1 in France. 

Ernest was married to Elizabeth, his home was Inverness St, Burnaby Lake, Edmonds, British Columbia. Ernest was not a tall man he stood just 5’6” with brown hair and grey blue eyes, he was 31 years old when he joined the Canadian Infantry for the War to end all wars. On 8 June 1916, Ernest made a military will bequeathing everything to his wife Elizabeth. There are some well preserved records for Ernest but nothing to suggest that the couple had any children. Ernest was 32 years old when he died, just a week before his nephew Leslie Samuel Stockman’s sixth birthday and a few months before his 33rd birthday. Ernest’s previous military record of service in Hamilton, Ontario would suggest that the brothers started out their life in Canada there. There is a Samuel C Wilcox buried in Woodland Cemetery in Burlington, Ontario who may well be Ernest’s brother Samuel Carlisle Wilcox. His name lives on…

© Jay Morgan Hyrons with permission