Origins & Family
Born in
Glemsford, Suffolk on April 20, 1885, the sixth of seven children of George
Goody, a railway plate layer and Elizabeth [née Oakley] a weaver of horsehair, Walter
moved with his family to Long Melford when still a small boy. In 1906 he married Harriet Mary Case originally
a domestic servant from Ampthill in Bedfordshire, they were to have two
children, George Frederick Gilbert born in 1907 and Alice May arriving a two years
later. Recorded on an earlier Census as
a bricklayer’s labourer living with his parents in Station Road, by 1911 Walter
had moved a matter of yards to his new home at 7 Rotten Row. When not working as a bricklayer his spare
time was taken up by playing in the village Silver Band and coaching and
refereeing local football matches.
Military Career
 |
| figure 1 - Walter and Fred (photo courtesy of David Carter) |
Attested on September 1, 1914, Sergeant Goody
was posted with 8th Suffolks to the British Expeditionary Force in
France on July 25, 1915 as part of 53rd Brigade, 18th [Eastern]
Division. His first five months were spent with his unit in the Brigade
Reserve, a period that passed without notable incident. In early January however things were to
change when his battalion moved into the front line opposite the fortified
village of La Boisselle, straddling the main road from Albert to Bapaume. The opposing trenches in this sector were in
places only feet apart which meant that Walter and his comrades were under
constant threat of bombardment from enemy mortar fire and aerial torpedoes. It was not until late June 1916, when the
battalion had moved to Carnoy that his unit carried out any offensive action. Although some useful intelligence was
gathered from the two raids a heavy price was paid with eighty men being killed
or wounded.
The Somme
Offensive which began on July 1 saw a marked change in the timbre of
fighting. During its opening phase, the
Battle of Albert, Walter’s battalion was again part of the brigade reserve and
could only look on as the carnage unfolded at Mametz Wood less than a mile
away. It was not until July 19 that Goody's
unit went into the fray, when it was part of an unsuccessful attack on the
village of Longueval, which guarded the western flank of Delville Wood. The assault originally planned for midnight
did not get under way until well after dawn, which meant that the men had to
cross two miles of open ground in full daylight, allowing German artillery and
machine gunners to inflict more than two hundred and thirty casualties to the
Suffolk battalion. August and much of
September was spent away from the front line, training in preparation for a
major assault on the village of Thiepval.
On September 26, 8th Suffolks took a leading role in the
Battle of Thiepval Ridge. Their
contribution was considered one of its greatest achievements, helping the
Allies to gain control of the German strongpoint of Theipval and the western
face of the much-vaunted Schwarben Redoubt. The cost to the unit however was high; over
two hundred casualties resulted from the two days of stubborn fighting. It may have been in this action that Sergeant
Goody won his Military Medal as the London
Gazette records the award on November 11, 1916.[2]
1917 saw
the battalion in action again, at Miraumont on February 18 when they attacked
Boom Ravine, on March 6 capturing Resurrection Trench facilitating the later
storming of Irles, and as divisional support during the Third Battle of the
Scarpe on May 3. By July the battalion had
been transferred from the Somme to the Ypres salient a hundred miles to the
north. The end of the month saw the
start of a series of British offensive actions, known collectively as the Third
Battles of Ypres. Goody’s battalion took
a significant part in the opening thrust, the Battle of Pilckem Ridge,
advancing nearly a mile through heavy rain before digging in to new positions. The push forward had been hard fought with the
unit sustaining 177 casualties from machine-gun and sniper fire together with a
menacing artillery barrage while traversing Sanctuary Wood. It was at this time that Walter Goody, now
promoted to Regimental Sergeant Major,[3] was awarded the Military
Cross.[4] The citation reads:
"For
conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty on two particular occasions. Under a heavy shell fire he removed [a] limber
containing Lewis guns and ammunition to a place of comparative safety, and it
was entirely due to his coolness and prompt action that other limbers were
safely unloaded and heavy casualties to men and material avoided. On the following day, when a very heavy enemy
barrage was threatening destruction to the transport which was bringing up his
battalion's rations, he went forward and stopped the transport and thus ensured
the safe delivery of the rations at a time when they were urgently required. His splendid conduct and utter disregard for
personal safety under exceptionally heavy shell fire greatly inspired all
ranks."[5]
It was probably at
this time that the King of the Belgians visited the battalion and awarded the
eponymous Ordre de Léopold II [Chevalier] to Walter Goody and others deserving
of the honour.[6] Curiously however the incident passed
unrecorded in the battalion’s War Diary.
Little further offensive action appears to have been undertaken by 8th
Suffolks and by the New Year news came through that they were to be
disbanded. On February 7, 1918 Goody,
fifteen officers and 265 other ranks were transferred to 7th [Service]
Battalion, Suffolk Regiment then stationed in the Lys valley as part of 12th
[Eastern] Division’s 35th Infantry Brigade.
On March 21, 1918
the German High Command launched a massive offensive, bolstered by the addition
of 500,000 men transferred from the Russian Front, against British positions on
the Somme. The 7th Suffolk
was swiftly moved south to Albert, where Goody and many of his comrades had
fought so bravely two years earlier. The
official history of the regiment records of this period that in common with
‘every other unit in this stricken area, [they] had their backs to the wall,
striving without artillery support, without bombs, rifle grenades, or trench
mortars, and with scarcely any shovels, to stem the onrush of overwhelming
numbers’.[7] By March 26 the battalion was defending the
northern approach to Albert from successive waves of German infantry. Despite initial success from concentrated
machine-gun fire the Suffolks were forced to make a fighting retreat from the
area around the railway station to positions three hundred yards further back, into
the town itself. This line was held
against fearful opposition until the early hours of March 28 when the exhausted
troops were finally relieved. In the two
days of fighting the battalion had suffered 256 casualties. The enemy was making huge advances all along
this section of the front and within a week the Suffolks were in action
again. On the morning of April 5 an
intense artillery bombardment presaged yet another German attack. By mid-morning the enemy had broken through
some of the battalion’s outlying positions, bringing forward a machine-gun to
threaten the unit’s left flank. In an
attempt to neutralise this danger the battalion’s commanding officer,
Lieutenant Colonel Hill detailed Walter Goody to attack and knock out the enemy
gun. As Hill’s appendix to the War Diary
records: ‘I at once sent up my RSM with a Rifle Grenade squad to try to and
deal with this gun in conjunction with the Stokes Mortars who I ordered to
search this area. Numerous casualties
were inflicted on the enemy in this operation.’[8] It was during this daring action that Walter
Goody was seriously wounded. In the final lines of his report Hill pays the
following tribute. ‘I must here place on
record the very valuable work performed throughout this period by 3/9691 RSM W.
Goody MC, MM. His work throughout was characterised by
extreme coolness and disregard for personal safety in order to make our
situation more secure.’ Walter was taken
to the 3rd Canadian Stationary Hospital at Doullens, where he died
of wounds the following day. A letter
written by Second Lieutenant S. B. Marchant to Walter’s widow sums up the
personal loss many in the regiment felt, when he wrote; ‘He was a good man
always. He was absolutely fearless, he was a
man and when I have said that I have said it all.’
In addition to his Military Medal, Military
Cross and Ordre de Leopold II [Chevalier], Walter Goody was twice mentioned in
dispatches by Field Marshall Sir Douglas Haig. He is buried Doullens Communal
Cemetery Extension No.1 [grave ref: VI.D.50], Somme, France and
commemorated on the Long Melford War Memorial.[9]
Postscript
The battalion’s valiant stand in the spring
of 1918 ended on the morning of the April 7 when they were eventually relieved.
The Battle of Ancre of which Walter
Goody played such a vital part, was the last battle honour won by 7th
Battalion, Suffolk Regiment. At the end
of April most of the men had been transferred to other units, only a small
cadre of officers and NCOs were left as a training unit, tasked with passing on
its knowledge and experience to newly arrived American Divisions.
Research by David Gevaux, MA
Melford and the Great War Project
–¯—
Notes
[1] Medal Roll and Index Card
[2] Supplement to the London Gazette, 11.11.1916, Issue No.10923
[3] See Goody’s Army Will dated
21.12.1916
[4] An account of the day’s action
is included as an appendix to the 8th Suffolk’s War Diary [WO
95/2039/1] and praises Goody among others for the “gallant and admirable work
performed”.
[5] Edinburgh Gazette, 18.10.1917, Issue No.955 &
London Gazette, 18.10.1917, Issue No.10712
[6] Supplement to the London Gazette, 15.4.1918, Issue No.4522
[7] Lieutenant-Colonel C. C. R.
Murphy, The History of the Suffolk
Regiment 1914-1927 [London: Hutchinson & Co, 1928], p.273
[8] Appendix to 7th
Battalion War Diary [WO 95/1852/1]
[9] Recorded in de
Ruvigny's Roll of Honour 1914-18, Vol.IV, p.65, Commonwealth War Graves Commission,
Soldier’s Effects File. For details of
the actions of 8th Battalion see War Diary [WO 95/2039/1] and Murphy op.cit., pp.146-50, 165-72, 238-43. For Details of the actions of 7th
Battalion after RSM Goody's transfer see War Diary [WO 95/1852/1] and Murphy op.cit., pp.272-77
