People

Harry Hooker was born in Hambledon on 21 June 1895, the son of Mrs Emma Hooker of Lytheys Close. Like many rural Hampshire boys at the beginning of the twentieth century, his future did not lie entirely in England. At the age of fourteen, in October 1909, he left home and sailed from Britain to Canada, arriving at Quebec aboard the Empress of Ireland. He was sent west to Manitoba, part of the large movement of young British farm workers who emigrated to the Dominions in search of opportunity and agricultural employment. There he grew up working as a farmer on the Canadian prairies.

Charles Richard Hooker was born in Hambledon in 1879, the son of Richard and Ellen Hooker of West Street. He grew up in the village in a working family and, like many local men, found employment as a general labourer. In 1907 he married Annie Louisa Biggs and they made their home in West Street where they raised two young children, Winifred and Harold.

Edward Thomas Hill was born in Hambledon and grew up in the rural surroundings of the village before choosing a very different life at sea. In February 1913, still a young man, he enlisted in the Royal Navy as a Stoker Second Class and travelled to Portsmouth to begin his naval training.
His first months were spent at the shore establishment known as HMS Victory II, the naval barracks where recruits were issued kit, taught discipline and instructed in the demanding technical duties of boiler-room work.

Albert Hamilton was born in Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire, about 1895, but grew up in Hambledon where his widowed mother Jane Hamilton raised her family in West Street. By 1911 he was working locally as a farm horseman, typical of many young men in the village whose lives were rooted in agricultural labour before the war.

James Hall was born in Hambledon around 1877, the son of George and Eliza Hall. He grew up in the village as part of a large rural working family and spent his childhood in Hambledon where he attended school before entering employment locally. By early adulthood he was working as a brewer’s drayman, a physically demanding occupation delivering barrels of beer from brewery to public houses by horse and wagon.

Reginald Goffin was born on 15th May 1895 at Toddington, Bedfordshire, the son of Benjamin Goffin and Elizabeth “Lizzie” Durrant. The family later moved to Hambledon where his father kept a drapers and grocers shop (Goffins Stores) at Commerce House (now West Street Cottage) in West Street. He spent his early childhood in the village before the family sought new opportunities overseas.

George French was born in Hambledon in 1897, the son of Samuel Thomas French and Emma Esther French. His childhood was marked by early loss when his mother died in 1902. Afterwards George, his father and younger brother moved into Hoe Gate Farm, the home of his grandfather Samuel French, a retired Royal Navy Petty Officer. The household combined farming life with a background of military discipline, and he grew up within a close rural family typical of the Meon Valley at the turn of the century.

Harry George Earwaker was born on 19th January 1889 in Hambledon, the son of Benjamin and Esther Earwaker. He grew up in West Street within the close rural community that later saw many of its young men leave for the war. Like others from the village, his life combined agricultural roots with later movement toward towns and new trades.

Frederick James Clay was born in Hambledon in 1882, the son of George and Keziah Clay, and grew up in the large rural family whose sons would later be remembered together on the Hambledon War Memorial. He was the elder brother of Frank Clay, who would also be killed during the war. Like many men of the parish he spent his early life working on the land, remaining closely tied to the farming community into adulthood.

Charles Bull was born in Hambledon in January 1893 and baptised in the parish church on 5th March of that year. He grew up in the same village household as his older brother Arthur, part of a rural family whose life revolved around agricultural work and close parish ties. Childhood in Hambledon followed familiar patterns of school, labour and family responsibility, with little expectation that life would extend far beyond the surrounding countryside.