A match manufacturer who fought and died ‘somewhere in Flanders’
James Henry had 14 siblings, of which only the youngest two were born after the marriage of his parents in 1901.
Submitted and researched by Andre van Ellinckhuyzen
The Tancrez Farm Cemetery, about 17 kilometres from Ypres (Ieper) in the Hainaut Province of Belgium, is located directly behind an old rebuilt farmhouse, which during The Great War was used as an aid post.
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In this cemetery, there are 333 Commonwealth war graves.
There are also two German war graves, some graves which are unidentified, and among the many whitewashed graves also stand four headstones, each bearing the Springbok Emblem, of South Africans who paid the ultimate price there in the faraway land of Flanders.
One of those young men was sadly a Vryheid boy. Canadian poet, soldier and physician, Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae penned this poem:
In Flanders Fields
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
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James Henry Williams was born in Vryheid in 1896.
His father was Michael Johannes (John) Williams, a blacksmith by profession, who was born in Riviersonderent in the Cape Province in 1835 or 1836, and died in Vryheid on April 7, 1915, and was buried in the Vryheid Cemetery.
James’s mother was Martha Katrina (Catherine) Williams nee Schwab.
Martha was born in Colenso and died in 1938, and was buried in the Stellawood Cemetery in Durban.
Michael and Martha were married on July 3, 1901, and they had their home at Erf nommer 537 in Vryheid, which was later sold in two equal halves at 50 pounds apiece, to two of their children, Abraham and Johanna Antoinette.
James Henry had 14 siblings, of which only the youngest two were born after the marriage of his parents in 1901:
Louisa Christina Swinburne nee Williams, born in Utrecht in 1868, who was from Merebank, near Durban, and died in 1948;
Abraham Johannes Williams, born in Utrecht in 1879, who was a bricklayer by trade and lived at 26 East Street in Vryheid until his death in 1944;
Fritz Carel Williams, a blacksmith by trade, who was born on August 11, 1879 and died on September 11, 1963 in Vryheid;
Christina Williams;
Michael Johannes Williams, who lived in Vryheid;
Martha Jones nee Williams, who lived in Johannesburg;
Elizabeth Annie Williams, who lived in Vryheid and was married in 1938 to Lukas Marthinus Johannes Nel, also from Vryheid;
Johanna Antoinette Hepplewhite, who lived at 45 Henwood Road in Durban and who was married to Ralph Hepplewhite. Johanna passed away on November 3, 1978 and was buried in the Stellawood Cemetery in Durban;
Daniël Williams, who lived in Mooi River and was employed by the S.A.R.;
Ernest Williams, who was from Pinetown;
Eliza Annie Mayes nee Williams, who lived in Cypress Avenue in Durban North, and was married to William John Wilfred Mayes in Durban in 1916;
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Susan McKane nee Williams, who lived at 75 1st Avenue in Durban;
Maria Kathleen Shadwell nee Williams, who also lived in Cypress Avenue in Durban and;
Alice Mabel Marriot nee Williams, who resided at 33 Walls Avenue Durban and married William Samuel Frederick Marriot in 1930.
After the death of her husband, their mother, Martha moved to Durban from Vryheid and had lived there with her daughter, Alice until her death.
Before joining up for the war, James was a match manufacturer by trade and he had two ‘home addresses’ on his enlistment record.
One was listed as Vryheid and the other as 25 Mitchell Road, in Durban.
The iconic Lion Match Company was established in 1905 in Durban, and the factory building is today a modernised office park, situated just behind the Jonsson Kings Park stadium.At the rank of private, James Williams – of the South African 2nd Infantry Regiment – was killed in action somewhere in Flanders on May 23, 1916 at the age of only 20 years.
James must have been seriously wounded in battle, and brought by ambulance or stretcher bearers to the aid post at Tancrez, where he then succumbed to his injuries.
He lies buried in the Tancrez Farm Cemetery. The three other South Africans who also lie at rest in the Tancrez Farm Cemetery are:
Stretcher bearer Peter Hans Peterson, 2nd South African Infantry, born in Copenhagen, Denmark, who was married to Ada Peterson of 57 Gale Street, in Durban;
Private Albert Ernest Reid, born in Durban in 1892, who was a fireman with the S.A.R. and whose parents resided at 11 Hardwick Street in Newcastle;
Private Percy Edward Watkins, of Kimberley. The name of James Henry Williams and his fellow countrymen is inscribed on the War Memorial at the St Peters Anglican Church in Vryheid.
Lest we forget.
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