George Betts Lance Corporal 8999 - 2nd Bn South Staffordshire Regiment Killed in action on Tuesday 27th October 1914 Commemorated on the Menin Gate, Ypres, Belgium. George Betts, christened 10 th  September 1893 in Gnosall, was one of ten children born to farm worker Thomas and Mary Betts: Samuel (born in Levedale near Bradley), Thomas, Albert, Henry, Sarah Ann, John, Emily, Ellen, George and Millie (who was born and died in the summer of 1895). George’s father was Thomas Betts from Bradley and mother Mary (nee Cooper) was from Broadhill. They married in 1876. The family had moved to the High Street in Gnosall around 1878-9. Their neighbours on 1881 census indicate they lived at the top part of the High Street shown here on the 1880 map. One of George’s older brothers (Thomas jnr.) joined the army as early as 1900, and had postings to South Africa (Boer War) and Mauritius before re-joining (the Northumberland Fusiliers) for WWI.  During the early period of his first engagement the family still lived on High Street, although according to Thomas junior’s army papers, in 1909 their address was then Bank Top. However, by 1911 they had moved to Whittington near Lichfield. Thomas junior was promoted to Lance Corporal but at his own later request, reverted to private. He died in Stamford Infirmary, Leicester as an Army Pensioner on the 7 th  June 1950. Lance Corporal 8999 George Betts joined the South Staffordshire Regiment, 2 nd  Battalion, and arrived in Belgium on the 12 th  August 1914. He was killed in action at Ypres on the 27 th  October 1914, just over a month after his twenty-first birthday. Commemorated on the Menin Gate, Ypres, Belgium. Panel 35 and 37.
The Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing, Ypres, Belgium
Dedicated to the British and Commonwealth soldiers who were killed in the Ypres Salient
of World War I and whose graves are unknown. The site of the Menin Gate was chosen because of the hundreds of thousands of men who passed through it on their way to the battlefields. It commemorates casualties from the forces of Australia, Canada, India, South Africa and United Kingdom who died in the Salient. Each night at 8 pm the traffic is stopped at the Menin Gate while members of the local Fire Brigade sound the Last Post in the roadway under the Memorial's arches.