Lemon, Archibald Dunlap (Archie)
Lieutenant
‘B’ Company, 12th Battalion, Royal Irish Rifles
Killed in action on Saturday 1 July 1916 (aged 41)
No known grave
Commemorated:
Commonwealth War Graves Commission
Thiepval Memorial (Pier and Face 15A and 15B)
Methodist College Belfast
Barn Mills Carrickfergus
Whitehead Yacht Club
Royal North of Ireland Yacht Club Cultra
Royal Ulster Yacht Club, Bangor
Royal Belfast Golf Club
Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of Ireland
Roll of Honour for the Great War 1914 – 1919, Lodge No. 7 Belfast
Journey of Remembering Belfast Book of Honour
BIOGRAPHY
Archibald Dunlap (Archie) Lemon was born on 2 April 1875 and he was a son of Archibald Dunlap Lemon JP and Ellen Lemon (nee Workman) who were married on 20 June 1861. In 1911 Archibald Lemon Senior and his family were living at Edgecumbe House, 249 Holywood Road, Strandtown, Belfast. Then aged 75, Archibald was a retired merchant and a magistrate for County Down. He and Ellen had six children including:
Marie (born pre-1864)
Ellen (born 9 June 1867)
John William (born 20 September 1868)
Edward (born 25 May 1872)
Archibald Dunlap (born 2 April 1875)
Archie Lemon attended Methodist College Belfast (MCB) and, after leaving school, he was an active member of the County Antrim Yacht Club in Whitehead, the Royal North of Ireland Yacht Club at Cultra, the Royal Belfast Golf Club in Craigavad and Masonic Lodge No. 7 Belfast.
In 1911 Archie was working as a flax spinner manager in Barn Mills, Taylor’s Avenue, Carrickfergus and at that time he was living in a boarding-house in Scotch Quarter, Carrickfergus.
[During the Second World War, the equipment at Barn Mills was used to manufacture parachutes.]
Archie Lemon enlisted and he served with the 12th Battalion Royal Irish Rifles. He trained in Newtownards, went to England in July 1915 and on to France in October 1915. On 1 July 1916, he was commanding 6 Platoon in ‘B’ Company with responsibility for capturing Railway Sap. During the advance two-thirds of his men were casualties – either killed or severely wounded. With only nine men remaining, Lieutenant Lemon entered the Sap and was shot at close range by two German soldiers.
Lieutenant Archie Lemon has no known grave and he is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial. Lieutenant Archibald Dunlap Lemon was 41 when he died and he is also commemorated in Methodist College Belfast; in barn Mills, Carrickfergus; in Whitehead Yacht Club; in the Royal North of Ireland Yacht Club; in the Royal Belfast Golf Club; in the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of Ireland Roll of Honour for the Great War 1914 – 1919, Lodge No. 7 Belfast; in the Journey of Remembering Belfast Book of Honour (Page 336).
Archibald Dunlap Lemon Senior died on 14 December 1922 (aged 86) and was buried in Belfast City Cemetery (Glenalina Extension, Grave O 13). Also buried there were his son Edward who died 17 April 1953 (aged 81) and his daughter Ellen Lemon who died 25 May 1959 (aged 91). At the time of their deaths Edward and Ellen were living in The Cottage, Glen Road, Craigavad. Edward Lemon had lived in Edgecumbe House until 1940 when the house was requisitioned by the Government during the Second World War. In the 1950s the house was acquired by Belfast Corporation and used as a Nursing Home. It was demolished in the 1990s.