LEMON, ELLIS GEORGE
Rank:
Service No:
Date of Death:
Age:
Regiment/Service:
Grave Reference:
Rank:
Service No:
Date of Death:
Age:
Regiment/Service:
Grave Reference:
Text on stone:
Private
14649945
17/09/1944
19
Hampshire Regiment 1st Bn.
II. A. 20.
He gave his life that we might live
Additional Information:
Son of George and Catherine Lemon, of Norwich.
Was killed in the opening battles of operation Market Garden. His unit was clearing the flanks just before the Dutch border.
In answer to your letters, I have found a photograph of Private Ellis George Lemon, my uncle, who was killed in 1944 at the Battle of Arnhem, and also a letter which he sent to Enid Lemon (his sister and my mother) shortly before he was killed. Ellis was born in 1926 and lived with his parents and sister in a railway worker’s cottage at Harling Road, near East Harling, as his father (my grandfather) worked as a plate layer based at Harling Road station. I believe Ellis worked as a farm hand before joining the army. He joined up with the Norfolk regiment but was taken ill with yellow fever and was hospitalized when his regiment left England for France. When he recovered he was sent with the Hampshire regiment to fight in the battle of Arnhem. He was 19 years old when he was killed, his sister Enid was 16 at the time. As well as his immediate family he left a fiancée, Mary, who lived in Norwich (she is mentioned in the letter) as well as aunts, uncles and cousins in Norwich and in Suton, near Wymondham. This is as much as I know as he died before I was born and there are now no surviving relatives who knew him.
From the service records of Ellis George Lemon, the following account can be reconstructed.
Ellis George Lemon was born on 13 June 1925 in Harling Road, Norfolk. In civilian life he worked as a malster.
He enlisted in the British Army on 1 July 1943 and joined the General Service Corps. On 2 April 1943 he was posted to the Norfolk Regiment, and on 14 July 1944 he was transferred to the Hampshire Regiment.
Ellis George Lemon embarked for service in North West Europe on 16 July 1944.
According to his service records, he was 5 feet 10 inches tall, with red-brown hair and blue-grey eyes.
Ellis George Lemon was killed in action on 17 September 1944.
