Rifleman 1888 Henry Schonewald 1/6th King's Liverpool Regiment
- Amanda T
- May 4
- 3 min read
With such an unusual name, there was only one possible entry on the CWGC database for Henry. His brother's name is also on the Holy Trinity War Memorial.
Henry Schonewald was born on 10th Dec 1895 in Liverpool, he was baptised in St Peter's on 20th December and the record shows that his parents were Janet and Hermann Carl Schonewald (a hairdresser) they lived on Rathbone Street.
In the 1901 census the family were living at 119 Rathbone Street. The census shows that Hermann was born in Germany but was now a British Subject. Janet was from Scotland. Hermann's occupation was a self-employed hairdresser and shop keeper. They had 4 sons and 3 daughters at home with them. Henry was the 6th of these 7 children.
Henry's father Hermann died in 1909.
In the 1911 census Janet was the head of the household, she had not remarried. She was living at 75 Windsor Street (very near to St James' Church) 6 of her 7 children were still at home; Emma aged 25 and Maude aged 19 were both working as "shorthand writer and typist" for a copying office and a stationery company respectively , Jessie aged 23 was a grocers assistant, Charles aged 17 was a railway clerk, Henry (our soldier) aged 15 was a stationers apprentice and Hermann aged 10 was a schoolboy.
It's interesting to note that the 1911 census had a column for "nationality of every person born in a foreign country" which had been incorrectly filled in for all the children, they were all born in Liverpool but had written German in this column. This suggests that they felt their family connection to Germany. Just four years later, after the sinking of the Lusitania (May 1915) there were anti-German riots in Liverpool, in the same week that Henry was killed in Ypres, shops and houses of people with German names were being attacked.
Military Service
Henry's service papers have survived. His attestation paper shows that he was in the 6th Battalion, The King's Liverpool Regiment (The Liverpool Rifles) with the regimental number 1888. He volunteered on 7th August 1914, aged 18 years and 8 months just 4 days after Great Britian declared war with Germany.
His enlistment papers show that his address at this time was 22 Peel Street (off Belvidere Road by Princes Park). His occupation was stationers assistant at Central Stationery Co, 19 North John Street.
His height was 5ft 8inches and his weight 9st 3lbs, his physical development 'fair'
He was absent from early morning parade 7am-7:45am on 25th Nov 1914 during training at Salisbury but the punishment awarded is unclear.
Throughout the collection of papers Henry's rank is referred to as either private or rifleman. He embarked on the "SS City of Edinburgh" from Southampton on 24.2.1915 and was killed in action at Ypres on 15.5.1915.
In 1919, Henry's personal effects were sent to his mother Janet and consisted of: penknife, canvas belt, chain, wallet, letters, photographs, papers, identity discs, french book, medical card.
Henry's medal card shows that his family received the 1914 Star, British War Medal and the Victory Medal.
Henry Schonewald was killed in action near Zillebeke. The battalion diary for the day does not mention him by name but has detailed reports from all 4 companies of the battalion that took part in the fighting around Hill 60. Most of the casualties on that day were from German machine gun fire as the companies were moving into their positions - having to cross open ground within 400 yards of the German machine guns. On this day the battalion lost 20 men killed and 68 wounded (other ranks).
Henry Schonewald has no known grave and his name is inscribed on the Menin Gate Memorial, Ypres.
The following notice was published in a local newspaper:
The article mentions that two of his brothers were serving, this would have been Robert and Charles as Herman was too young. Charles hadn't gone overseas at this point so we can assume that the brother who was 'progressing favourably' was Robert.
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