L/CPL. 41074 ELIAS GORE
16th August 1917
L/CPL. 41074 ELIAS GORE of the West Yorkshire Regiment was killed in action on August 16th 1917 in the early stages of the Battle of Passchendaele near Ypres in Belgium.
Elias was born in Accrington and was twenty nine years old. Before the war he lived with his wife in Ashworth Street, Baxenden. He then worked in the Spindle and Fly department at the textile engineering works of Howard and Bullough’s in Accrington. Shortly before war was declared the family moved to Todmorden. He enlisted in the Northumberland Fusiliers and later in the war, after treatment for wounds, he was transferred to the West Yorkshire Regiment.
Elias was buried by his comrades, but because of the heavy fighting and the extremely difficult conditions, his body was never later recovered. His name is therefore inscribed on the Tyne Cot Memorial some six miles north-east of Ypres. The Memorial is in the form of a semi-circular wall around Tyne Cot Cemetery, the largest War Cemetery in France or Flanders. On the Memorial are inscribed the names of over 35,000 men who died in the Ypres area between August 16th 1917 and November 11th 1918, and have no known grave. By coincidence Elias died on the first day of the commemorative period.