– 6094015 PRIVATE STANLEY ALLAN HERBERT SHEPPARD

When this series of articles started in 2019 the intention was to publish short biographies of each of the Wisborough Green men who are remembered on the village war memorial on the 80^th anniversary of their death.

In this piece, we are going back 85 years to look at Stanley Sheppard.  Information about him was scant at the outset and it was unclear who precisely he was out of a few candidates and when and where he died.  Now, with details about him having emerged, it is possible to record his story.

Stanley Allan Herbert Sheppard (his name is spelled Shepherd on the memorial) was born in Wisborough Green on 26^th December 1916 to parents Frank and Nellie.  He was the youngest of five children, two girls and three boys.  The family lived at Crossways Cottage on the Petworth Road at a time when it was home to two households.  Frank Sheppard was a farm labourer who moved to wherever he found work.  Born in Storrington, he married in Balcombe and thereafter his family’s peregrinations can be traced in the birthplaces of his children; East Grinstead, Staplefield, Capel and finally Wisborough Green where he worked as a cowman on Orfold Farm.

On the eve of the Second World War twenty-three-year-old Stanley was employed as a general labourer.  He enlisted in the Queen’s Royal Regiment (West Surrey) on 17th January 1940 and was posted to the 2/7th Battalion, a 2nd line Territorial Army battalion, which was sent to France on 22nd April.  It was intended that their training would continue in-theatre and initially they were assigned pioneer duties encompassing light engineering and labouring tasks near Abancourt south-east of Amiens.  On 10th May the German army ended the ‘Phoney War’ by invading France and the Low Countries quickly advancing driving back the Allied armies.  Stanley’s battalion was moved north-east to Abbeville over the course of 17th and 18th May with the intention of evacuating from Cherbourg, which it eventually did on 5th June.  The Germans overran the British positions in Abbeville on 20th May but some were retaken in a Franco-British counter-attack.  On 5th June, the Germans attacked again and prevailed.  At some time during the fighting and confusion, Stanley Sheppard lost his life.

Stanley was originally posted as missing along with 90 other members of the regiment.  His exact date of death is not known and he is listed as having died between 21st May and 4th June 1940.  He is buried along with two comrades in Caours churchyard.  Caours is a village and commune approximately 3 miles north-east of Abbeville.

Left: The three graves of comrades from the 2/7th Battalion, the Queen’s Regiment in Caours churchyard. Stanley Sheppard’s grave is on the left.