Person

James Hodgson, the son of Thomas and Margaret Hodgson, was born in Tantobie, Durham in February 1889, He had a brother and lived all his life in the Tanfield area of Durham, living with his aunt after the deaths of his parents. He was working as a pit head labourer in a local colliery when he enlisted at Consett on 19 December 1915. However, as he was working in a mine, he was immediately transferred to the Army Reserve and was not called up until May 1917.

After training, with the 4th and 5th Battalions, James joined the 15th (Service) Battalion Durham Light Infantry (DLI) and landed in France on 28 September 1917. Two months later, in early November 1917, he was badly concussed when a German shell smashed his dugout, killing the other occupants.

In late March 1918, during just four days of fighting on the Somme, the 15th DLI lost almost 500 men killed, wounded or missing. On 27 May, the battalion once again faced a massive German attack and was forced to retreat, losing over 450 men killed, wounded or missing in two days of fighting. One of the missing was Private Hodgson, taken prisoner and sent to a prisoner of war (POW) camp in Limburg.

After the Armistice in November 1918, British prisoners of war began to return home but James was not amongst them and his aunt, Isabella Miller, wrote to the War Office seeking news of her nephew – “We are very anxious to know here he is or what is become of him”. Eventually the sad news arrived that James had died of “suspected dysentery” in the Reserve Hospital in Mariahilf, Neuemahr on Armistice Day – 11 November 1918 and had been buried in the local Catholic Cemetery. In 1923, along with many other servicemen who had died in Germany, he was disinterred and re-buried in the Cologne Southern Cemetery.
For further information:
Commonwealth War Graves Commission:
https://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/901775/hodgson,-/
https://www.cwgc.org/find-a-cemetery/cemetery/34600/cologne-southern-cemetery/

North East War Memorials Project:
http://www.newmp.org.uk/detail.php?contentId=7879#listlink
http://www.newmp.org.uk/detail.php?contentId=7880#listlink

Civil Parish: Tanfield

Birth date: 1889

Death date: 11-Nov-1918

Armed force/civilian: Army

Residence: 1 Chapel Row, Tantobie, Durham (1891 census)
Nodham’s Cottage, Tanfield, Durham (1901 census)
35a South View, Tantobie, Durham (1911 census)
9 Victoria Terrace, Lanchester, County Durham (British Army Service Records)

Religion: Church of England.

Employment: Pit head labourer British Army Service Records).

Family: Father: Thomas Hodgson
Mother: Margaret Hodgson (nee Stokeo)
Brother: Joseph Hodgson,

Military service:

4th, 5th & 15th Battalions, Durham Light Infantry
Service No.: 40565
Private

Medal(s): British War Medal
Victory Medal

Memorial(s): Cologne Southern Cemetery, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany
Grave Ref.: IX.G.19
D.L.L 1914-1918 Book of Remembrance, Durham Cathedral
All Saints Church, Lanchester, Durham 1914-1918 Plaque
Lanchester Memorial Hall, Durham 1914-1918 Plaque

Gender: Male

Contributed by Durham County Record Office. | John Edwards