Percy enlisted in the 93rd
Peterborough Overseas Battalion on April 1st 1916 in Peterborough,
Ontario. He listed his occupation as a
farmer, and declared that he had no previous military experience. He was unmarried and a member of the Church
of England. He was a month shy of his 20th
birthday and stood just over 5 foot 6; he was described as having a ruddy
complexion, hazel eyes, and medium brown coloured hair. He signed his signature in a shaky hand.
The 93rd Battalion
loaded aboard the S.S. Empress of Britain and left Halifax, June 15,
1916. After more than a month at sea the
troopship docked in England on July 25th 1916. By October 6, 1916,
Cooper’s 93rd Battalion was disbanded and its men transferred to
various other battalions as reinforcements.
Pte. Cooper was to join the 39th Battalion (A Company), a
unit from eastern Ontario, at West Sandling , England, for training. Percy
trained in the camps of Shornecliffe during the fall of 1916, at which time he
was admitted into Moore Barracks Hospital for a week with Laryngitis. He was
discharged November 1st and by the 15th he was again transferred
and taken on strength by the 75th Battalion. He left for France shortly after and joined
the 75th at the front on November 21st 1916.
Percy would have joined the battalion
as it came off the front line trenches of the Somme. The 75th had in the previous days
suffered dozens of casualties on an attack on the enemy trenches. Percy would have spent three weeks with the
75th drilling and parading in the rear as the shattered Battalion
was resupplied and put into working order.
In December, the 75th Battalion
transferred to the Vimy Sector to begin preparation for the Canadian attack on
the ridge. Though December until the
date of the attack in April, the Battalion alternated holding the front line
trench, ( named Tottenham Trench in front of Hill 145 on the ridge), and
holding reserve trenches, drilling, resting and gearing up for the attack in
rest areas behind the lines in the Coupingy area. During this time, on December 18th, Pte. Cooper was admitted to No.4. Stationary
Hospital at Arques with inflammation of the larynx. He spent close to two weeks recovering and
eventually rejoined his unit on the 30th of December. Less than a month after that on January 20th,
Percy’s War Service file indicates that he was sentenced to 3 days pay for
negligently losing kit.
To break up the monotony of
training and to gather information for the upcoming assault, the 75th
Battalion launched a disastrous trench raid in the early hours of March 1st. After an initial bombardment with gas and
high explosive shells every man of the 75th advanced under the cover
of darkness to assault the enemy trenches.
They were received by a hail of machine gun bullets and stiff resistance. The few men that made it into the enemy
trenches soon found themselves unsupported and beat a hasty retreat back
through No-Man’s Land. In this debacle
the 75th reported receiving 70 dead, 32 missing and 119 wounded, in
turn they reported inflicting heavy enemy casualties and taking 1 prisoner.
On the April 9th, the
day the main attack was launched, Percy Cooper and the 75th held
position in Tottenham Trench on the line in front of Hill 145 on Vimy
Ridge. Their main objective was a
portion of the German trench known as Beer Trench, a position close to a
kilometre behind the German front line. The attack commenced at 5:30 a.m. All
four Canadian divisions simultaneously advanced behind a curtain of artillery
shells. The situation was not easy, the
War Diaries of the 75th report that a strong point in front of their
trench was not “mopped up”, and snipers inflict considerable losses. By 3 p.m. it is reported that the German
front line was taken along with 40 prisoners.
A considerable number of the enemy were still lingering in the objective
area into the early night of the 9th, and by 9:30p.m trench
objectives were consolidated. That night
and the day of the 10th, the 75th held the formerly
occupied and held German trench named Beer Trench, while other Battalions of Canadians
leapfrogged them and attacked further.
They were relieved off the line and went back to camp to rest. The butcher’s bill was high: Of 18 officers
only 1 comes through alive and unwounded.
59 men missing, 159 wounded and 96 killed in action, including Pte.
Percy Cooper. He was killed on action on
the 9th of April 1917 during the attack on Vimy Ridge.
Percy Cooper was originally buried
in one of the small battlefield cemeteries ½ miles S.S.W. of Givenchy. In an effort to consolidate the graves of the
soldiers in the many small cemeteries in the area, his body was exhumed in 1920
and reburied in Canada Cemetery no.2, in Pas de Calais, France. His name appears on the Dummer Township
Cenotaph in Warsaw, Ontario.
Sources:
Archives of Ontario. Registrations of Births and Stillbirths – 1869-1913. MS 929, reels 1-245. Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Archives of Ontario.
Canada. "Soldiers of the First World War (1914-1918)." Record Group 150, Accession 1992-93/166, Box 4930 - 35. Library and Archives Canada, Ottawa.
Library & Archives Canada. “Complete Service File: Percy Thomas William Cooper. No.1976-19. <http://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/military-heritage/first-world-war/first-world-war-1914-1918-cef/Pages/item.aspx?IdNumber=115876> [20014].
Library and Archives Canada, 2007. <http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/databases/census-1911/index-e.html>.
Series RG31-C-1. Statistics Canada Fonds. Microfilm reels T-20326 to T-20460.
Library and Archives Canada; Ottawa, Ontario, Canada; War Diaries: 75th Canadian Infantry Battalion 1916/08/11-1917/12/31. RG9, Militia and Defence, Series iii-D-3 Volume 4943, Reel T-10750-107551, File 452, Access code: 90. <http://data4.collectionscanada.ca> 2014
Peterborough Evening Examiner. “More Members of the 93rd Battalion Are Killed in Action”. May 07 1917. P.5.
War Graves Registry: Circumstances of Death
Records. Record Group 150, 1992–1993/314, Boxes
145–238. Library and Archives Canada. Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
Great Work Nathan. Send me an e-mail at mattferguson@hotmail.ca - i'd like to chat and collaborate.
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