Taylor, William Robert (Robert)
Rifleman
No. 17033, ‘A’ Company, 13th Battalion, Royal Irish Rifles
Killed in action on Saturday 1 July 1916 (aged 21)
Buried:
Serre Road Cemetery No. 2, France (Grave XIII. A. 1)
Commemorated:
Commonwealth War Graves Commission
Donaghadee and District War Memorial
BIOGRAPHY
Rifleman William Robert Taylor (No. 17033) was killed in action on the first day of the Battle of the Somme. Initially he was posted as missing in action and in June 1917 it was officially confirmed that he must be presumed to have been killed in action.
Rifleman William Robert Taylor’s family placed a For King and Country notice in the 16 June 1917 edition of the Newtownards Chronicle:
TAYLOR – Missing since 1st July 1916 Rifleman William Robert (Robert) Taylor, Royal Irish Rifles, now reported killed, the dear grandson of William and C. Conway, Killaughey, and much beloved nephew of Agnes Tollerton. It contained the verse:
Greater love hath no man,
That he lay down his life,
With all its promises,
That other men might live.
Sadly mourned by his sorrowing Aunt, Agnes Tollerton, Canneyreagh, Donaghadee.
Deeply regretted by his many relatives.
In the Soldiers Died in the Great War 1914 – 1919 database it is recorded that William Robert Taylor was born in the townland of Cannyreagh, Donaghadee.
William Robert Taylor was a grandson of William and Charlotte Conway (nee Muckle, sometimes Muckil) who lived in the townland of Killaughey, Donaghadee. William Conway was a farmer and he and Charlotte had eleven children:
Agnes (born 18 August 1866)
William (born 23 February 1868)
Samuel (born 23 November 1869)
Thomas (born 20 August 1871)
Mary (born 27 March 1874; died from morbus cordis 17 February 1897, aged 22)
James (born 24 December 1875)
Jane (born 20 December 1877; married Thomas Eady on 12 July 1909 in Newtownards Registrar’s Office; died 15 November 1959)
David (born 16 December 1879)
Sarah (born 20 March 1882)
Hugh (born 29 August 1884)
Charlotte (born 19 May 1888)
In 1901 William Robert Taylor (aged 5) was living in the townland of Ballyvester with his aunt, Agnes Tollerton (aged 34), her daughter Agnes Tollerton (aged 10), her son John Tollerton (aged 7), and Jane Conway (aged 22), a ‘boarder’.
Agnes Conway and James Tollerton, a widowed sailor from Donaghadee, were married on 22 June 1886 in Newtownards Registrar’s Office.
Prior to the outbreak of the Great War William Robert Taylor worked as a farm servant. He enlisted in Donaghadee, went to France on 9 December 1915, served with the 13th Battalion Royal Irish Rifles in 108th Brigade of the 36th (Ulster) Division and was killed in action on the first day of the Battle of the Somme.
Rifleman William Robert Taylor’s body was recovered and buried in Serre Road Cemetery No. 2, France.
Rifleman William Robert Taylor (No. 17033) made his will on 27 November 1915 and in it he left all his property and effects to Agnes Tollerton. In his will he referred to Agnes Tollerton as his ‘Mother’. In all other documents, including the Army Register of Property and Effects, Agnes Tollerton is referred to as his ‘Aunt’.
Despite extensive searches, no civil registration record has been found for William Robert Taylor’s birth.
It is possible that William Robert Taylor (born around 1895/1896) was a son of unmarried Mary Conway who died on 17 February 1897, and was reared by his married aunt, Agnes Tollerton.
Rifleman William Robert Taylor is commemorated on Donaghadee and District War Memorial.