Asa JOWETT

3/11221, Private. b. 1879, Clayton Heights d. Wed. 5th May 1915 (aged 36).

Asa Jowett was born in 1879. When he was aged 2 he was living with his parents in Dolphin, Queensbury and when he was 12 his family were living at 40 Bobby Green, Queensbury with his Father Benhamin and his mother Susannah.

In 1901 census Asa now aged 22, is shown working as a Stone Mason and living at Mutton Pits Farm, Queensbury along with his mother Susannah, now a widower aged 50 and his brothers Amos aged 26 listed as the farmers Son, James aged 14 working as a cotton spinner and a daughter. In 1910 an Asa Jowett is shown renting accommodation at 22 Alma St, Queensbury and is not shown on the following 1911 census as living with his mother and brothers and sister at 20 New House Lane in Clayton Heights.

Asa was the first Clayton army casualty to die in the war, Asa was recalled to the army when war was declared in the preceding August of 1914. He was shipped over to France in one of the first waves of soldiers; he belonged to the 2nd Battalion, Duke of Wellington’s Regiment and was present at the Battle of Mons. This was the first major test of the British forces, where it was realised at the cost of many men that the face of warfare was changing dramatically from old Victorian values into something new and much more deadly.

Soon afterwards, Asa was moved to the Ypres sector of the front and he was to stay there throughout the winter of 1914. It is also likely that he shared the experience of the 1914 Christmas truce, where both sides laid down their arms on Christmas Eve and took part in unofficial festivities. Many troops left their trenches and met in no-man’s land to exchange tobacco or food gifts.

At the end of April 1915 the German army began using a new weapon, chlorine gas, on an unprepared British force. The gas mask had scarcely been put into mass production, and most soldiers did not even possess one. The first two or three weeks of these attacks were terrifying to the soldiers stuck in their trenches without any form of protection, other than the suggested idea of urinating on a handkerchief and tying it round the mouth and nose to stop the gas getting into the circulatory system. Asa was present at this time, and when his trench’s turn for a gas shelling came, the 2nd Duke of Wellington’s were not ready. Asa died of wounds during this attack, and the Germans occupied the trench shortly after.

Asa’s mother Susannah Jowett was informed, and she in turn duly informed the local press – this was the first of nearly a hundred notifications to be made to the Bradford papers by residents of the Clayton area before the armistice came in November 1918.

Asa is remembered at the Menin Gate Memorial in Ypres, along with thousands of other men who have no known resting place.

Jowett Family

Asa’s elder brother Amos married in 1911 and moved to Darlington working on his own account in retail as a ‘Milk Badger’. Asa’s younger brother James is shown working as a joiner in building trade in 1911, living at home. The next record is his death in 1934 aged 60.

The youngest relative Orlando Jowett is shown in 1939 as a Fish and Chip Salesman with his wife Martha living at 24 Robertshaw St in Bradford and his death is recorded in 1969 aged 73.

Susannah, Asa’s mother died in 1933 aged 82.