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Frederick William SMITH on the Occold War Memorial and Frederick TAYLOR born in Occold but on the Creeting St Mary memorial present something of an enigma.
The Suffolk Regiment section of 'Soldiers died in the Great War' at Bury shows the only Occold Smith as:
FRED WILLIAM SMITH born in: Cransley, Northants. Enlisted at Kettering in the 12th Battalion Suffolk Regiment as a private, service No 42333. He died on the 10th April 1918 in Flanders & is commemorated on the: Ploegstreert Memorial.
However, this is not shown on the electronic version
The Suffolk Roll of Honour calls him Frederick & has him in the 8th Battalion. To add confusion the 8th was disbanded in France two months before this Smith was killed.
Unlike 'Soldiers died...', the Roll of Honour was not compiled until about 1930 and was just an ad-hoc list of names sent in by anybody who remembered something or a parish councillor sending in the names on the war memorial.
There is no roll of Honour for Cransley, but a Frederick William Smith in the Suffolks shown on the Kettering Roll of Honour but this time in the 2nd Battalion.
The 1901 Census, however, has a Bedingfield born, 11 year old Frederick William Smith (therefore born around 1890 & 24 upon the outbreak of war) living in part of Poplar Hall (far end of Redlingfield Road close to boundary with Redlingfield) with the other part not in occupation.
With Frederick Taylor we have no other information than an Occold born man commemorated on the Creeting St Mary Memorial.
The 1891 Census has a different Smith family living in one half of Poplar Hall and Frederick Taylor Snr. (born Mendlesham) and his family including 4 month old son Frederick Jnr. in the other half.
As both of these neighbouring boys were of the same age it is tempting to think of two boys who played together in the 1890s and both died in the Great War.