Arthur Baker
Date of birth: 1922
Date of death: 18.7.1944
Area: Wakefield
Regiment: East Yorkshire
Family information: Son of Albert and Edith Annie Baker
Rank: Lance Corporal
Service number: 4545959
War Service
Arthur Baker was Lance Corporal 4545959 East Yorkshire Regiment 2nd Battalion. His name appears on the Carr Gate Memorial.
The 2nd Battalion of the East Yorkshire Regiment served with the 8th Infantry Brigade attached to the 3rd Infantry Division throughout the whole war. After having been evacuated at Dunkirk the battalion invaded Normandy again in mid-1944 during the D Day landings. The 2nd Battalion landed on Sword beach on 6th June 1944 but with a heavy number of casualties. They took part in the attack on the Chateau de la Londe on 28th June, then on 7th July they supported the push towards Caen. On 18th July the battalion attacked the village of Touffreville which was on the road to Paris, being part of a larger operation called Operation Goodwood. An aerial bombardment was supposed to have prepared the way for the attack, however the bombs had missed Touffreville and the German forces were unscathed. Although they managed to take the village by 6pm, it was not without a cost with 104 casualties, one of whom was Arthur.
Arthur is buried in the Banneville-la-Campagne war cemetery.
The Wakefield Express printed the following obituary:
“MR ALBERT BAKER, late of Carr Gate, now residing at Dairy Farm, New Crofton, has received official news that his youngest son, L/Cpl Arthur Baker East Yorkshire Regiment, was killed in action in North West Europe on July 18th 1944.”
According to the memorial his family put in the same paper, Arthur’s brother William was also serving overseas as a Sergeant in the Royal Engineers.
Family Life
He was the son of Albert and Edith Annie Baker according to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Albert Baker had married Edith E Jackson in 1912. There were 8 children registered in Wakefield with mother’s maiden name of Jackson, the first in 1914 and the last in 1926. Arthur was registered in the June quarter of 1922. I believe his mother Edith died aged 42 in 1931. I found Albert Baker living at 25, Lawns Lane in the electoral rolls of 1938 and 1939. In the 1939 Register he was living there with son John born in 1919 and an iron moulder. There was also a closed record, presumably Arthur or one of his siblings.
Banneville-la-Campagne War Cemetery
