Remembering Our Fallen

Howden-le-Wear History Society

Roderick Lauder was born in 1898 and was the ninth child and younger brother of Elijah Roderick who also made the ultimate sacrifice during the Great War. The family story is told in the section on Elijah who died in 1916. There is little information about Roderick’s war service, not even the year he enlisted. Recorded are his rank and regimental number, Private 83642, and the fact that he served with the 12 th /13 th Battalion of the Northumberland Fusiliers. His family, having lost Elijah in 1916, and with the war nearing its end, must have been hoping for Roderick’s safe return, but their younger son’s battalion had been involved in the final advance of the allies in Picardy and casualties occurred. Along with others of his group, Private Roderick Lauder was killed in action on November 4 th 1918, just seven days before the cessation of hostilities. Roderick was buried in a small French cemetery near Fontaine-au-Bois with over 90 other men who died in October and November of that year.

Roderick Lauder

Private Roderick Lauder’s memorial on the CWGC records.

Image courtesy of www.cwgc.org