Born:22 April 1886, Bradford
Died: 5 June 1920, Idle
Buried: Idle Parish Church
Address: Ivy Cottage, New Street, Idle
Parents: Geoerge & Susannah
Spouse:
Siblings: Sam, Thomas
Occupation: Stone Mason
Organisations/clubs: Trinity Harriers
Military
Rank: L Cpl
Medals/awards:
Rolls of Honour: Holy Trinity, Idle
Children:
Regiment: Cameron Highlanders
George Gordon Naylor
George Gordon Naylor was born on
22 April 1886, the son of
stonemason George Naylor and his
wife Susannah.
At the time of the 1911 census he
had followed in his father’s
footsteps and was working as a
stone mason.
We are particularly fortunate to
have a detailed account of George’s
war starting with an article that
appeared in the Shipley Times &
Express on 25 March 1915:
“Pte George Gordon Naylor, son of
Mr and Mrs G Naylor of Ivy
Cottage, New Street, Idle, paid a
short visit home during the
weekend.
“Pte Naylor is the only Idelian who
has become a Highlander and his
kilt attracted much attention.
“He joined the colours soon after
the outbreak of hostilities and is in
the Cameron Highlander Regiment.
“He is an elocutionist of no mean
order and was a popular member of
the old Parish Church Harriers.”
The novelty of kilt was still
apparent two months later:
Enthusiasm
“L Cpl George Gordon Naylor, the
first Idelian to wear the kilts, has
spent the Whitsuntide holidays in
the district and during his stay has
rendered good service to his King
and country in the way of
recruiting.
“He put much enthusiasm into the
work and got quite a number to
sign on.
“L Cpl Naylor has proved himself
an exceedingly smart recruit. That
is the reason why he has been given
his first stripe.
“Those capable of judging declare
that there are greater things in store
for such a promising youth.
“His regiment, the 7th Cameron
Highlanders, is camping on
Salisbury Plain.
“L Cpl Naylor was a prominent
member of the old Idle Trinity
Harriers and he has won himself a
good name as an elocutionist.”
On 30 July we read that in a letter
home “he describes in detail what
happened from leaving the camp in
England to arriving at the scene of
operations.
“He speaks of the wonderful
organisation which is evident in
connection with the army and of
the excellence of the arrangements
for the transportation of British
troops.
“As transports leaves our shores
laden with troops there are many
things which make one realise as he
has never done before that there is
no gainsaying the fact that
‘Britannia rules the waves.’
“Speaking of his experience in
France, L Cpl Naylor remarks on
the quaint uniforms worn by the
French soldiers – red trousers and
blue greatcoats fastened back at the
corners.
French Tommies
“The French Tommies carry their
rifles in a funny style, he says, and
they smoke cigarettes while on
duty.
“As the Gordons were entering one
town the French soldiers who
happened to be about marched with
swaggering gait to the music of the
pipe band as it gaily played ‘Cock
of the North’ headed by Pipe-Major
Findlater, V.C., the Dargal hero.
“In the South African engagement
where this hero won the V.C. he
still went on playing his comrades
on to victory although shot through
both ankles.
“In his last letter L Cpl Naylor says
you cannot find any young men in
the ordinary occupations as you
pass through France; they are all
soldiering. And the women are
doing their work, even on the
railway trains and engines.
German airman
“He and Pipe-Major Findlater are
staying in the same barn. One
evening a German airman came
scouting over them and spotted
their ammunition waggons.
German shells started dropping in a
few minutes and an old woman and
some cattle were killed whilst a
number of soldiers were wounded.
“L Cpl Naylor was near the second
shell which fell but escaped unhurt.
At the time the batteries from
which the shells were coming were
five or six miles away.”
On 1 October the paper reported:
Hideous contrast
“L Cpl George Naylor, in a letter to
a friend, speaks of the terrible
nature of the war and adds that in
one place the sun was shining
beautifully and the sparrows
chirping in the trees and nature
seemed to be at her best when
suddenly there came a hideous
contrast and a German shell
whistled over them.
“Every house in the village where
they were billeted had been shelled
and not a single building had been
left standing. The Belgians had to
leave their homes at a moment’s
notice.”
And he finished 1915 with another
description of life at the front:
“In a letter to his parents L Cpl
George Gordon Naylor, who has
been at the Front since June, says
he is in the best of health.
A bit rough
“It is a bit rough out there, he goes
on, but he does not mind the rain
and the frost, so long as he can
escape the shells and the bullets.
“He is in the trench leading up to
the firing line and keeps meeting
his old friends.
“The tin he gets his dinner out of
was filled with soil the morning he
wrote as a result of a shell bursting
close by.
“They get very little bread to eat
but are given plenty of biscuits
which are as har as iron but full of
nourishment. They are wearing
long Wellington boots.
“He is now training as a bomber
thrower.”
On 14 January 1916 the Shipley Times &
Express took advantage of George’s leave
to publish a long interview with him on the
day he returned to France. It gives a
fascinating insight into life at the front:
“For a long time George has been in the
thick of the fighting and although he has
had many thrilling experiences and hair-
breadth escapes, he is anxious to do a
little more to help to bring Germany to her
knees.
‘We have taken up the war against
Prussian militarism and its attendant
cruelties with a great hope,’ he
said. ‘We realise that justice and
freedom cannot be got without
great sacrifices.
‘We are fighting the Germans as
foes of freedom and if the young
men at home fully realised what a
hard struggle we are engaged in, there is
not a single man who would hold back for
a moment.’
“He had seen enough of the Germans, he
said, to convince him that they are no fools
at warfare. In fact, he thinks that man for
man, Germans are little, if any, inferior to
the British as fighters and in the struggle
against the Huns he has adopted the old
motto, ‘never belittle your foe.’
Hill 70
“He took part in the great advance when
Loos was captured and in the attack on Hill
70. He witnessed fearful and heartbreaking
scenes at that great engagement.
“Not only would the British have been
driven from Hill 70 but would also have
been driven out of Loos had it not been for
the bravery of a mere handful of Britishers
who stuck to their guns like heroes.
“At the retirement from Hill 70, when the
counter-attack was made by the Germans,
two companies of the Gordon Highlanders
were ordered to stick to their posts, even if
they had to be sacrificed.
“These few men, however, held back the
Germans until most of the British were
able to retire safely.
“At the critical point in the fighting the
situation was saved by a brave young
British officer who appeared on the scene
with a machine gun.
“ ‘Where can I put my Dicky Bird?’ he said
nonchalantly although the ping of bullets
cold be heard all round him.
“He got a good position for his gun and did
splendid work as the Germans were
advancing but ammunition soon ran out.
He kept at his gun in order to give the
Germans the impression that he was
saving his ammunition until the
psychological moment.
“While he was doing that, George and few
others were crawling about amongst the
dead to collect ammunition so as to ‘keep
the pot boiling.’
“Luckily, the Germans thought the English
had something up their sleeve and did not
care to venture too near. As the foe retired
for a short distance the officer behind the
machine gun made good use of what
ammunition had been got together by the
men under his command.
“L Cpl Naylor remarked that when at the
front he read with surprise in the Express
the remarks of ‘Wanderer’ in regard to
parsons and he was delighted to see the
reply the vicar of Idle to what ‘Wanderer’
had said.
‘Take my tip for it,’ he observed, ‘the best
men at the Front and the bravest men at
the Front are the doctors and parsons.
“You can often see parsons standing at the
side of a grave in which several bodies
have been placed and although shells are
bursting dangerously near and bullets are
flying in all directions, they never flinch a
hair’s breadth but go on with the funeral
service as if nothing exceptional was
happening.
“One doctor who was almost fagged out,
crawled up Hill 70 in the early hours of the
morning and rendered what medical aid he
could to the wounded and the
dying. He realised that in so doing
he was placing himself in a very
perilous position but he didn’t mind
that – he was so anxious as the
doctors are to a man, to do his best
for the boys.
Clinging to a tent pole
“A parson who had been badly wounded in
the shoulder was so heroic that he refused
to undergo an operation until he had
conducted his usual service and he
actually stood and preached to us one of
the best sermons I even heard in all my
life.
“While he was preaching he had to hold
himself up by clinging to a tent pole. The
sermon he gave that day I shall never
forget.
“When one saw the small little cross over
the graves of the peer and the peasant,
the rich man from the castle and the poor
man from the cottage, each of whom had
borne the brunt of battle, it made one
proud to be an Englishman, said L Cpl
Naylor.
“Amongst those he had met at the front
were Herbert Thornton, Westfield Lane,
Idle, and Albert Holdsworth, Albion Road,
Idle.”
We pick up George’s description of
the war on 3 March 1916. The use
of aircraft in war was still in its
infancy and attracted a great deal
of interest at home and at the front
where many young men would
have seen planes for the first time.
“Pte George Gordon Naylor of Idle
sent a description of an aerial battle
from France: ‘I have just been
watching an aeroplane fight with a
German who dared to come over
the British lines,’ he wrote.
‘Our aircraft guns fired behind him
and kept him from flying straight
back. Then one of our aeroplanes
started machine gun fire at him and
he began to climb higher.
‘Meanwhile our aeroplanes were
coming from all directions until we
had five around him. Two or three
went over the German lines to keep
him from escaping. He had no
chance whatever of escape.’
“In his letter, Pte Naylor also
described the effect the war was
having on the local population: ‘I
passed a village the other night and
could scarcely recognise it as a
place where human being had ever
lived except by little things that
had been blown out of the houses
when the civilians had left them
‘We found a haystack with half a
dozen machine guns inside it
which had belonged to the
Germans. The haystack had been
propped up with a number of iron
bars. I wonder what tales those
bars of iron would tell of the fall of
Britain’s sons?’
On 4 August 1916 we learn that
George is in hospital in Boulogne
suffering from scarlet fever.
“Judging however from a letter he
wrote on Sunday he is progressing
wonderfully.
“At the time of writing Cpl Naylor
had been laid up for about a
fortnight. He has had to rough it
since he went to France and on
several occasions has very
narrowly escaped being shot.”
And on 27 July, he is again being
nursed:
“L Cpl George Gordon Naylor says
in a letter to Cllr John Garnett of
Idle that his eye-sight, his chest
and his lungs have been much
affected by German gas but adds
that after having been blind for five
days he is recovering his sight.”
George returned to Idle after the
war but no doubt as a result of the
illness and gas attacks he had
suffered during the war, he died on
5 June 1920, aged 34. He was
buried at Idle Church three days
later and his grave is marked by a
Commonwealth War Graves
Commission stone, which gives
him the rank of Second Lieutenant.
