The data is the editor’s interpretation of documents from the:
The National Archives, London, Commonwealth War Graves Commission, Ancestry and Find My Past. Thank you for his great great nephew for further details.
Speller Herbert James, signs up in 1914 and is killed on the 16th November 1916. Age 27. Son of Charles and Hetty Speller of New Park Lodge Newgate St. Hertford. Born in Henham, Essex; He had three brother of Augustus, Walter of Turnford and Leonard (all three died in the war) and a sister Alice May of Hertford Heath;
In 1901 Herbert was living with his family at Hertford Heath. He was working as a rope maker at Little Amwell.
By 1911 he was living in Lincolnshire, working as a woodman.
At the outbreak of war Herbert joined the Bedfordshire Regiment Service No. 4/7281. He was sent to the Western Front in October 1914. On 4 March 1915 Herbert was admitted to no 3 casually clearing station with rheumatism and sent to a convalescent depot on 22 August 1915, he was transferred with 14 men from his unit to the 179 tunnelling core station at Albert and became a sapper in the Royal Engineers Service No. 139146.
On the 16 November 1916 Herbert was killed by a snipper whilst carrying wood for the tunnel they were digging. He is buried at Albert Communal Cemetery Extension, France. He also has a plaque at Lochanger Crater.