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71383   Lieutenant John Brooksbank Garnett
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Dated added: 30/12/2015   Last updated: 07/02/2020
Personal Details
Regiment/Service: 1st Battalion, Royal Welsh Fusiliers (British Army)
Date Of Birth: 11/09/1916
Died: 23/05/1940 (Killed in Action)
Age: 23
Summary      
John Brooksbank Garnett was the only son of William B and Eleanor C Garnett. His father was a Lieutenant-Colonel in the Royal Welch Fusiliers, who lived at of Corick, Clogher. John Garnett was born on 11th September 1916. John Garnett attended Winchester College. In 1934 he went to Magdalen College in Oxford. In the summer of 1938 he joined the Royal Welch Fusiliers. Lieutenant John Brooksbank Garnett was serving with the 1st Battalion of the Royal Welch Fusiliers when he was killed in action in the village of St Floirs.
Lieutenant John Brooksbank Garnett
Further Information
John Brooksbank Garnett was the only son of William B and Eleanor C Garnett. William Brooksbank Garnett and Eleanor Constance Story were married on 15th July 1915.
Lieutenant-Colonel William Brooksbank Garnett DSO, DL, JP, Royal Welch Fusiliers, of Corick, Clogher, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland
Eleanor Constance Garnett was the daughter of John Benjamin Story.
John Garnett was born on 11th September 1916, possibly in Clogher, but no GRONI record can be found. He was one of two children.
Family: William Brooksbank Garnett, Eleanor Constance Garnett, Jean Elizabeth Brooksbank Garnett (tbc), John Brooksbank Garnett (born 11th September 1916).
John Brooksbank Garnett was known as Bill.
John Garnett attended Winchester College. He was a good footballer. He was also in Sixth Book and a Commoner Prefect.
In 1934 he went to Magdalen College in Oxford, but owing to concussion caused by a motor accident, had a year away. He completely recovered and took his degree in 1939.
In the summer of 1938 he was gazetted to a University Commission in his father’s regiment, the Royal Welch Fusiliers, with whom he had already spent several months on attachment.
The 1st Battalion of the Royal Welch Fusiliers went to France as part of 6th Infantry Brigade, 2nd Division of the British Expeditionary Force.
On May 23rd 1940, the battalion received orders to move to the area of St. Venant-Robecq, where it was to defend the bridges over the La Bassée canal against attacks by two German divisions.
Lieutenant John Brooksbank Garnett was serving with the 1st Battalion of the Royal Welch Fusiliers when he was killed in action in the village of St Floirs. He was 23 years old.
The official date of his death is given in all sources as May 23rd 1940, though it may have been a day later since it was on May 24th that the battalion went into action in St Floris, where Garnett is buried.
Garnett is commemorated by Special Memorial Grave 6 in St. Floris churchyard, Pas de Calais. Seven RWF soldiers are buried there: three of them, whose graves could not be precisely located, are commemorated by special memorials, inscribed “Buried near this spot”. Lt Garnett and the section of men were traveling in a Bren Gun carrier when it was ambushed by German tanks killing the entire crew.
He is commemorated locally on Clogher War Memorial.
The CWFC record Lieutenant John Brooksbank Garnett as the son of Lt.-Col. W B Garnett, D.S.O., D.L., J.P., formerly of the Royal Welch Fusiliers, and of Eleanor Constance Garnett (nee Story) of Clogher, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland.
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Relevant Dungannon Area Locations
No Location Region Location Notes Longtitude Latitude
1 Corick (Corrick House) Clogher Parents lived at Corick 54.425628 -7.163108
References and Links
No Link Reference Map Doc
1 Facebook - Royal Welch Fusiliers Museum Details and photo of John Brooksbank Garnett
2 FindAGrave.com Photo of John Brooksbank Garnett's gravestone
3 War Graves Photographic Project Photo of John Brooksbank Garnett's gravestone can be purchased here
4 Wincester College Detailed biography and photo of John Brooksbank Garnett
Dungannon District's War Dead Acknowledgements 2015-2023