Reepham Benefice

Leonard H. Barber was 21 years old when he died on the fields of Flanders in Belgium. In those 21 years he lived and worked throughout Norfolk, as a stable boy and farm labourer, eventually joining the army in 1915. Before he ‘joined up’, Leonard married Phyllis Allen in 1915. Born in 1893, Leonard Barber was the second eldest of 7 children (4 boys, 3 girls) – before the end of the war, all of the Barber sons had lost their lives on the battle fields of France and Belgium.

Leonard didn’t just become ‘another soldier on the battlefield’; he gained a ‘stripe’ as Lance Corporal and passed, with distinction, as a 1st class musketry instructor on 14th September 1917 after 3 weeks of intensive training at Bisley training barracks. Instructors like Leonard Barber went on to train tens of thousands of new and raw recruits to the front lines in Belgium and France, making up the numbers of the dead that already mounted into the hundreds of thousands since the beginning of the war.

As the war progressed, Leonard Barber’s place in the war went from instructor to active soldier once again, supporting his regiment in front-line actions along the trenches in the Flanders region. As part of the redeployment of troops for an ‘all out offensive’ against the Germans; this would ultimately spell the beginning of the closing engagements of a long and protracted war.

Leonard Barber did not die in what history would record as a ‘major offensive’; he did not die in a major battle like his brother, Frederick C. Barber at the Battle of the Somme two years before, he died in day-to-day front-line activity – much of which involved small skirmishes, exploring no mans land and laying mines for possible German advances. In this case, Leonard died whilst participating in a small scale engagement that was employed to draw attention from a much larger offensive elsewhere. This had become the expected duty of those who fought in this region of Belgium, often venturing into enemy territory in small units, engaging in skirmishes that neither won ground or liberty – these skirmishes were indicative of life in the front line in this region of Flanders, the region of Belgium that became the final resting place of Leonard H. Barber.

Leonard’s body was never recovered – most likely lost amongst the chaotic wilderness of no mans land, his remains finally interred through future bombardment and shelling for later offensives. Within six months of his death, the war was brought to a close on what is now known as Armistice Day: November 11th 1918 at 11 ‘o clock in the morning. Ironically, the final engagement of the war took place on almost the same spot where the first engagement between German and British forces took place in 1914.

Born Reepham, 1893 - Died Belgium April 8th 1918