John Humphrey Stillman

John Humphrey Stillman was a gifted scholar, committed Baptist and active church worker who attended the Lower School of John Lyon and later became a bank clerk. He served with the Suffolk and North Staffordshire Regiments during the First World War, dying in the closing weeks of the war, aged 23 in September 1918 succumbing to wounds received in action.

Civilian Life - John Humphrey Stillman was born in Paddington on 22 October 1894, the only son of Frank and Annie Ellen Stillman. The family later lived in Hounslow, from where John attended the Lower School of John Lyon, Harrow. He was academically gifted, matriculating for the University of London at the age of 16, and subsequently worked as a bank clerk and became a member of the Bankers’ Institute. Religion was an important part of Stillman’s civilian life. He was brought up in a Christian home and became closely involved with the Town Baptist Church. He was baptised there on 28 April 1912, aged 17, and served as a leader in the junior Sunday School, secretary of the Christian Band and a Seat Steward.

In memorandum, The Rev. Frank Batten later described him as a “humble Christian and a gifted church worker. From his earliest years he took a deep interest in religious matters and as a school boy he was nick-named 'John-three-sixteen' "

Military Life - Stillman enlisted in the Suffolk Regiment in October 1915 and subsequently served with the North Staffordshire Regiment. His service record identifies him as Lance-Corporal John Humphrey Stillman, No. 44682, of the 12th (Service) Battalion, Prince of Wales’s (North Staffordshire Regiment). He served in France and Flanders and was transferred to the North Staffordshire Regiment shortly before his death.

He died of wounds sustained during the final Allied push of the Hundred Days Offensive. By late September 1918, the German army was retreating across northern France under relentless Allied pressure. The 12th North Staffords were heavily engaged in the rapid advance, driving the enemy back through devastated terrain and former battlefields. During the fighting or tactical advances in late September, Stillman was severely wounded by enemy artillery shelling or machine-gun fire. He was successfully evacuated from the immediate firing line to a field ambulance or one of the active medical installations operating nearby. The Thilloy Road Cemetery was specifically started in mid-September 1918 by the 53rd Field Ambulance and utilized by the 3rd, 4th, and 43rd Casualty Clearing Stations to bury soldiers who succumbed to their battlefield injuries. Stillman died at one of these medical units on 30 September 1918, aged 23, just weeks before the Armistice. He is buried at the Thilloy Road Cemetery, Beaulencourt in the Pas-de-Calais region of France.

A contemporary Middlesex Chronicle report similarly recorded that he died in hospital in France from wounds received in action. His death was marked by his church as well as by his family. Preaching at the Town Baptist Church on Sunday evening, the Rev. Frank Batten said: "I cannot allow this occasion to pass without referring to the loss this church has received through the translation of our fellow member Lance Corporal John Humphrey Stillman. He died of wounds received in action before his parents could reach his bedside last Monday at the hospital in France. He was trained in a Christian home, and that training was the foundation of his life. From his earliest years he took a deep interest in religious matters and as a school boy he was nick-named 'John-three-sixteen.' His parents subsequently expressed their thanks to friends who had written to them with sympathy and condolence following the loss of their only son.

Footnote: Some records show Stillman holding the rank of Private, others as Lance Corporal. This may illustrate that he had been selected for promotion just before he was wounded.