The Loyal North Lancashire Regiment,
Killed in Action,
1st October 1918,
Age 21,
Buried Proville British Cemetery
Newspaper Reports:
ENLISTED AT 17, MILITARY MEDALIST AT 20.
Lance-corporal Jack Hargreaves, (21), of the Loyal North Lancashires, who held the Military Medal for gallantry at Ypres on July 31st 1917, has been killed in action. He was one of the three sons of Mr. James Thomas Hargreaves, of Highfield Cottage, Haslingden, who were serving in the war, but lived with his grandfather, mr. john Hargreaves, and aunt at 188 Grane Road, Haslingden. He was previously at Birtwistle's Grane Road Mill, and, like his brothers, is on the roll of honour at Laneside Church. He enlisted in September 1914, when only 17, and went through the Dardenelles campaign before he was 18. He was accustomed to say that having come safely through the Dardonelles trials he believed he would come safely through the remainder of the war. The Military Medal he won at Ypres was presented to him at the Christmas dinner last year at Haslingden Public Hall Hospital by the Mayor (Major Halstead), who referred to the pleasure he took in that duty because the recipient was a member of a family he had known for many years. Lance-corporal Hargreaves - he was then Private modestly said in reply that "all the boys there had done their bit. He had only done his duty." The official record of Lance Corporal Hargreave's brave deed was that "he was one of two who were the first to jump into a trench, with a Lewis gun under one arm and a revolver in the other hand. All the Germans were shot; the trench was cleared, and this enabled the rest of the company to advances." Lance-corporal Hargreave's companion (Sergeant Watson) was killed. The two brothers still serving are George (232), who is in the R.A.M.C. and serving at a camp for German prisoners in England; and Corporal Fred Hargreaves (26), who is foreman of the salvage department at a hospital in France.
