EDWIN JOHN RAYNOR

MILITARY FUNERAL AT NEWBURY "ONE OF BRITAIN'S BEST SOLDIERS"

WITNESSED BY LARGE CROWD OF PEOPLE

The sad reality of war was brought home to the townspeople of Newbury on Easter Monday morning when there was laid to rest in Newbury Cemetery, Driver Edwin John Raynor, of 93rd Battery, Royal Field Artillery. To do him the last and greatest honour was to give him a soldier's funeral, and the Army Service Corps who are quartered in the town provided an escort, being headed by the Newbury Town Band, starting out from their headquarters in the Wharf, the A.S.C. Marched to the Newbury District Hospital by way of Bartholomew-street, and soon gathered a large concourse of people in their train. On arrival at the Hospital, the procession was formed under the supervision of Colour Sergt. Roberts, and to the awe-inspiring strains of "The Dead March" in "Saul" the cortege slowly wended its way to the Cemetery, long lines of people forming an avenue throughout the route and evincing a demeanour of the utmost respect. The coffin, which was covered with a Union Jack and a number of beautiful floral tributes, was conveyed on a hand bier in charge of four A.S.C. Men, supported on either side by the members of the firing party. It was immediately followed by a coach the mourning relatives, which, was followed by the rest of the Army Service Corps, Inspectors Harnon (?) and Gawthorne representing G.W.R. Staff, Mr. W. Sparrow of the local V. A.D., Red Cross and Captain Walter Partridge, Chief Recruiting Officer of the District. The first portion of the funeral service took place in the Chapel at the Cemetery, the Rev. A.G.P. Baines, Chaplain of the Hospital, officiating, as he also did at the graveside, where as the Committal Sentences were read, the grief of the mourners at the loss of a favourite son and brother was deeply affecting. The service over, there ensued what is practically the most poignant and yet most stately part of a military funeral, the firing of volleys over the grave by the party of A.S.C. Men, which was followed immediately by the soldier's last call, that which in every day life summons him to rest, but which in a case of this description was but a farewell to a comrade who, having served the country well, was thus speeded on his way to a higher service. The military then reformed and, headed by the band, as is usual at such functions started off to headquarters to the strains of an inspiring march.

The mourners in the procession were the Mother, Mr and Mrs Persani (sister and brother-in-law), Mrs Holloway (sister), Miss Hudson (the deceased's betrothed), Mrs R.F. Jeffrey and Mrs Ilsley.

There were several beautiful floral tokens of esteem, including those from Mother and Lillie, Jim and Dad, from Annie, from Maud, from mrs R.F. Jeffrey and Mrs Ilsley, from Captain Walter Partridge, "In memory of one of Britain's best soldiers."

The deceased soldier was a native of Hockley*, Birmingham, and had been in the Royal Field Artillery nearly seven years. He came of quite a fighting stock, his deceased father having served in the Egyptian War with the 19th Hussars, in which regiment he put eight years. At the present time, two brothers are also in the Army. Sergt. A. Rayner, who has served 22 years in the First Cheshire Regiment and went through the Boer War, is at present a prisoner of war at Saltoun in Hanover. The second brother, Driver J.A.Rayner, A.S.C., was called up as a reservist, and went out with the First Expeditionary Force; he is still serving at the front. Several other relatives of the family are also doing service, including a brother-in-law, Private Holloway, a reservist of the 1st Worcestershire Regiment, who has been wounded, but returned in time to take part in the battle of Neuve Chapelle. Had he lived to September, the deceased would have completed seven years in the Royal Field Artillery, some considerable period of which was spent in India; in fact it is surmised that the drastic change from the climate of India to that of France, with service in water-logged trenches brought on the rheumatism which preceded the complications causing his death. During the three months he had been at the Newbury District Hospital, he had received the skilful treatment of the medical staff and the kindly consideration of the nurses.

The mother and relatives of the late Driver Rayner desire to express their grateful thanks to the Medical and Nursing Staffs of the Newbury District Hospital for their kindness to the above deceased; they also wish to thank the Army Service Corp and Newbury Town Band for the kindly honouring of the deceased at the funeral on Easter Monday and Mr. and Mrs Jeffrey for sympathetically entertaining them on the same day.

Newbury Weekly News 8 April 1915.

**NB His mother on the birth certificate was Mary Emma Luckey and not Williamson as it states on the certificate . The reasons are not clear as to why she gave her correct maiden name for the registration of her first two children both born in Ireland but adopted the name Williamson after the family moved to her husband Arthur's home county of Yorkshire