2nd Battalion, Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers (British Army)
Died:
02/05/1944 (Unknown)
Age:
21
Summary
The 1911 census records Crozier Fleming Moffit as a seed merchant. He and his wife Eliza Jane were living with his parents on their farm in Belragh, Aughnacloy, Tyrone. John Anderson Moffit was born about 1923. Corporal John Anderson Moffit was serving with the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers when he died in Italy on 2nd May 1944, age 21. Corporal Moffit is buried in Beach Head War Cemetery, Anzio, Italy.
Further Information
John Anderson Moffitt was the son of Crozier Fleming and Eliza Jane Moffit. Crozier Fleming Moffit and Eliza Jane Reid were married on 16th June 1910 in the district of Dungannon.
The 1911 census records Crozier Fleming Moffit as a seed merchant. He and his wife Eliza Jane were living with his parents on their farm in Belragh, Aughnacloy, Tyrone.
Known family: Crozier Fleming Moffit, Eliza Jane Moffit, Hamilton Moffitt (born 26th January 1912), Margaret Moffitt (born 15th April 1913), Sidney Moffitt (born 15th February 1915), Robert Moffitt (born 15th May 1916), Hilda Moffitt (born 16th November 1917), Joseph Moffitt (born 26th May 1919), John Anderson Moffitt (born about 1923), John Anderson Moffit was born about 1923.
John Anderson Moffit was born about 1923.
From the Mid Ulster Mail dated 25th March 1944: Tyrone Sergeant’s Exploit – Stalked German Gun
After a patrol of five had found what they thought was a Tiger tank slinking behind a house, a beating-up patrol of ten with a Piaf gun went out to smash the tank. Details of what happened were told to a military observer in Italy by men of the Inniskillings. Sergeant John Moffitt, of Belragh House, Carnteel, Aughnacloy, telling about the recce patrol, said:-
‘Our objective was to recce house in which movement had been seen a mile and a half away from our own lines. We got 250 yards from the house and I positioned .. Bren gunners .. the house and got on a ridge where I could watch for enemy movement. Two men crawled up the ditch and when they reached the house, one searched the farm buildings and the other went through the front door. Then they went round the back of the house. One round one side, one round the other.
When they got round the back of the house they saw what they thought was a Tiger tank – it later turned out to be a self-propelling gun on a tank chassis. They retraced their steps and then went over to a haystack in front of the house. There thet were spotted with two Schmeissers opening up on them. They made for the ditch, got into it, and came back to us. A few seconds later, the two owners of the Schmeissers came out of the front door – they had either been in the S P gun or came through the back door of the house or else they had been hiding in the loft – and our Bren gunners opened up on them. Then, by leapfrogging, the main part of the patrol got back, while one Bren gun covered our movements. We pulled out and reported what we had seen.’
On receipt of the information, a patrol of ten men with a Piaf gun was ordered to go out and destroy the German gun mounted in a tank chassis and this was done.
Corporal John Anderson Moffit was serving with the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers when he died in Italy on 2nd May 1944, age 21.
Corporal Moffit is buried in Beach Head War Cemetery, Anzio, Italy.
The CWGC record Corporal John Anderson Moffit as the son of Crozier F and Elizabeth S Moffit of Aughnacloy, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland.
