St. Leonard’s Gate was one of the worst affected street in Lancaster, with 22 casualties on the street and its associated courts. The whole area around St. Leonard’s Gate, much of which is now car parks, was badly affected. Parallel to St. Leonard’s Gate, Edward St had a further 20 casualties, and Alfred St another 10. An additional death from Lodge St took this small area’s total casualties to 51.

The casualties on St. Leonard’s Gate were as follows. Note that the low numbers on St Leonard’s Gate are found at the north (Bulk Rd) end of the street.

• No. 12: Harry Winder, Killed on 27/4/1915 at the Second Battle of Ypres with the 1^st/5^th Battalion of the King’s Own Royal Lancaster Regiment. He was possibly one of 13 men from B Company killed by the same shell. Harry Winder of number 30 also died that day. His nephew saw him die. He left a wife and five children. His brother-in-law Issac Phillipson died of wounds in December 1917 while a prisoner of war.
• No. 12: Henry Askey, Killed on the Somme (31/10/1916) with the 7^th Battalion of the King’s Own Royal Lancaster Regiment. It is not clear why Askey and Winder shared an address.
• No. 30: Anthony Gradwell, Died on 27/4/1915, the same day as Harry Winder at number 12 (above). He is buried at Hazebrouck Communal Cemetery, where a casualty clearing station was located. As he is buried behind the lines and is recorded as having died of wounds he had probably been fatally injured some days before.
• No. 34: Thomas Kew, Died of wounds 24/4/1915. He was another casualty who died with the 1^st/5^th Battalion, King’s Own Royal Lancaster Regiment at the Second Battle of Ypres.
• No. 40: Anthony Jennings, Died 4/2/1915, the first casualty from St. Leonard’s Gate. He died while training at Blackpool and is buried in Lancaster Cemetery.
• No. 40a: Frank Haworth, Died 25/3/1918 near Arras early on the German Spring Offensive. He was 19 but had already served abroad for a year and eight months
• No. 51 and 2 East Court: Robinson Davies, Died 17/4/1916 at Blackpool with the 3^rd/5^th King’s Own Royal Lancaster Regiment and is buried in Lancaster Cemetery. He lived at 2 East Court while his wife Janet is recorded as living at 51 St Leonard’s Gate after the War.
• No. 71: Edward Turner, Killed 6/7/1916 with 10^th Battalion, Lancashire Fusiliers early in the Somme Campaign.
• No. 79: Peter Husband, Died 24 or 31/5/1915 in Flanders with the 2^nd/5^th Battalion, Kings Own Royal Lancaster Regiment. It is not clear what the connection would have been between him, who lived at number 79 with his parents, and Ernest Hillyard (below) who lived there with his wife, would have been.
• No. 79: Ernest Hillyard, Died of wounds 11/10/1918 having been wounded the previous day. When he died, a month to the day before the war ended, he had been serving abroad for over three years. By coincidence, Arthur Jackson at number 108 died the same day.
• No. 83: Joseph Wardley, Died 25/9/1915, the equal worst day of the war for Lancaster with 19 casualties. Like most of his contemporaries that day, he was killed at the Battle of Loos. He was a professional soldier who had previously served in the Boer War.
• No. 85: James Wise, St. Leonard’s Gate’s last casualty, he died on 21/1/1919 after the War had ended. He had served abroad for four and a half years, almost the entire war.
• No. 93: John Peel, Died of wounds 24/10/1916 with the 7^th Battalion, King’s Own Royal Lancaster Regiment. He was aged 37 and had only been in France for seven weeks before being killed during the Somme Campaign
• No. 100 and Allbright’s Yard: T Towers, Died of wounds 26/4/1915, another casualty of the 1^st/5^th Battalion, King’s Own Royal Lancaster Regiment’s experiences at the Second Battle of Ypres
• No. 103: Christopher  Dickinson, One of the street’s first two casualties he died 11/2/1915 (note that he is also recorded as dying in 1916 but this appears to be a mistake as he is 1915 on the Commonwealth War Grave Commission website and this is consistent with the Cemetery he is buried in). His brother, who lived with their parents at 9 Beaumont St, Skerton, was killed in July 1917.
• No. 104 and 106: Robert Bleasdale, Died 9/4/1917, the opening day of the Battle of Arras. He was 33 and had previously been wounded twice in 1915 and again in 1916. He had a wife and three young children.
• No. 108: Arthur Jackson, Died of wounds 11/10/1918, the same day as Ernest Hillyard at number 79. He was 19.
• No. 112: Thomas Campbell, Killed 16/11/1915 in France. His mother, Christina, lived at 112 St Leonard’s Gate while Thomas lived at 21 Blades St with his brother Robert who was killed in August 1918.
• 4 Allbright’s Yard: G H Taylor, Killed 4/12/1915 in Flanders. He was 18. His brother-in-law JD Taylor of 44 Cable St also served
• 2 East Court and 51 St. Leonard’s Gate: Robinson Davies, See number 51 above
• 3 East Court: Fred Leack, Died of wounds 5/8/1916 having been wounded in July. He is buried at St. Pol Communal Cemetery Extension, a cemetery associated with a hospital well behind the lines in France. At the time of his death his brother-in-law William Bratherton had been killed with the 1^st/5^th on 27/4/15 at the Second Battle of Ypres, possibly one of 13 victims of a single shell that day. His nephew John Fryers had been wounded at Gallipoli.

 

Other badly affected parts of Lancaster include:

• Primrose, where Clarence St, Eastham St, Westham St, Prospect St and Dale St all had more than 10 casualties each. In total 93 people from this little area died.
• The cluster of houses east of Bulk Rd that consists of Green St, Albion St, Hinde St and Ridge St. In total 38 people from here died, 15 from Green St alone.
• Skerton in the small cluster of streets downstream of Skerton Bridge between the river and Lune St from where 41 people died.
• Slightly up river in Skerton, the area between Aldren’s Lane, Pinfold Lane and the river from where 75 people died.