Selman, Harry

Harry Selman was born during the second quarter of 1888 in Tormarton, Gloucestershire, England. His parents were Thomas Selman who was born in Tormarton and Sarah Green, born in Calstone, Wiltshire. The couple married on 7 May 1881 in Tormarton.

Harry did not have any siblings that survived; two other children  had been born to Thomas and Sarah but they died at birth or shortly after. For the 1891 England census the family was living in a cottage in the parish of Tormarton in the village of Chipping Sodbury, Gloucestershire, Thomas’ occupation given as agricultural labourer. For the 1901 England census the family was in Tormarton, with Thomas’ occupation listed as garden labourer and Harry was working as a grocer’s errand boy. Sarah Selman died during the second quarter of 1909.

By the  1911 England census Thomas was living with his widowed sister Sarah Fletcher in Tormarton. Harry was no longer living with his father, having moved to 10 Islington Street, Swindon, Wiltshire and was living with Alfred and Elizabeth Luckett. His occupation was given as baker journeyman, Alfred’s being foreman baker.

Aboard the Royal George, Harry embarked from Avonmouth, England in June of 1914, destination Kenora, Ontario,  arriving in Quebec on the 24th. He had relatives in Kenora, his father’s brother John William Selman, wife Alice (Knee) and children Ella and Elsie Selman had immigrated to the area in May of 1911. Later that year Harry returned to England aboard the Pretorian, arriving in Glasgow, Scotland on 8 December 1914, destination Islington Street, Swindon, Wiltshire where he had been living in the 1911 census.

Private Harry Selman enlisted on 12 July 1915 at Aldershott, Hampshire  with the Princess Charlotte of Wales’s Royal Berkshire Regiment, 5th Battalion. He was reported as killed in action somewhere in France and Flanders on 25 August 1918. At the time of his death his battalion ‘was involved in the Battle of Amiens, engaged in heavy heavy fighting from July 22, pushing the enemy back and capturing Meaulte, Mametz, Carnoy, Hardecourt, and Faviere Wood.’ He is interred in the Peronne Road Cemetery in Maricourt, Somme, France.

Harry’s father died during the fourth quarter of 1930 in Chipping Sodbury and his mentor Alfred Luckett during the first quarter of 1929 in Swindon.

Private Harry Selman is commemorated on the Kenora Cenotaph, on the Kenora Legion War Memorial, and on the War Memorial in the parish church yard of St Mary Magdelen in his home town of Tormarton.

by Judy Stockham

photographs in England courtesy of Paul Best, Tetbury, Gloucestershire
grave marker photograph by Steve N, findagrave.com

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