LIEUTENANT CYRIL HENRY
Can anyone help with more information concerning Lieutenant Cyril Charles Henry of the 2nd Battalion, aged 21, killed at the battle of Loos on the 26th September, 1915. He has no known grave.
In 1916 Cyril Henry Nursery School was founded in Woolwich as a Day and Night Nursery for children of local munitions workers in the Royal Arsenal. The nursery was funded by Lieutenant Henry’s mother Lady Julia Henry nee Lewisohn who part of a wealthy and philanthropic New York Jewish family. His father was Sir Charles Henry was a baronet and Liberal MP. He was their only child.
The work of the Nursery was depicted in a painting by Sir John Lavery, a WW1 war artist (currently in the Imperial War Museum). The building became a clinic following the war and then reverting to a Nursery during WW2 but always bearing the name Cyril Henry. In 2005 the Nursery was merged with Mulgrave Primary School and moved to new premises. The old building a rather interesting and well maintained wooden bungalow was sold and demolished.
Following this act of municipal vandalism I am anxious that the memory of Cyril Henry and his nearly 90 years of ‘service’ to the people of Woolwich is not forgotten and that the children at Mulgrave School are aware of his history.
There is a fair amount of the family history on the internet including good works by Lieutenant Henry’s parents in the field of education and child welfare. They instigated, by bequest , the Henry Fellowship a scheme similar to the Rhodes Scholarship whereby Oxbridge, Yale, Harvard, and Princetown post graduates are able to study on the opposite side of the ‘pond’. This is still running today.
I would be delighted if you can add further to this history. I have information that Lieutenant Henry was a career soldier and in 1914 was posted to the Colonial Office. He rejoined his regiment the 1st Battalion (your record shows 2nd Battalion) and was killed in action in 1915, ‘perhaps in the action in which the 1st Battalion lost 19 of their 26 officers in a single day.’
JONATHAN ORRELL
BURSAR
MULGRAVE PRIMARY SCHOOL AND EARLY YEARS CENTRE