Woods, Norman Hill
Military Cross
Private
No. 2540, Black Watch (Royal Highlanders)
Lieutenant
3rd Battalion attached 7th Battalion, Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers
Killed in action on Thursday 16 August 1917 (aged 24)
No known grave
Commemorated:
Commonwealth War Graves Commission
Tyne Cot Memorial, Belgium (Panel 70 to 72)
Holywood and District War Memorial
First Holywood Presbyterian Church
BIOGRAPHY
Norman Hill Woods was born on 26 May 1893 at 17 Summer Street, Belfast and he was a son of John and Agnes Woods (nee Stewart) who were married on 13 March 1888 in Cliftonville Presbyterian Church in Belfast. John Woods was a son of Hill Woods, a baker. Agnes Stewart was a daughter of John Stewart, a coal merchant.
The Woods family lived in Belfast, in Summer Street; Oldpark Road and Chichester Avenue and then in Churchfield, Bangor Road, Holywood.
John Woods worked as an insurance clerk and he and Agnes had at least eight children:
Margaret (born 14 January 1889 at 17 Summer Street, Belfast)
John Stewart (born 5 February 1891 at 17 Summer Street, Belfast)
Norman Hill (born 26 May 1893 at 17 Summer Street, Belfast)
William Ewart Gladstone (born 30 May 1895 at 48 Oldpark Road, Belfast)
Marjorie Stewart (born 30 June 1897 at 5 Willow Grove, Belfast)
Francis Scott (born 15 January 1900 at 8 Chichester Avenue, Belfast)
Duncan Stewart (born 2 September 1903 at 8 Chichester Avenue, Belfast)
Agnes Stewart (born 7 November 1905 at 8 Chichester Avenue, Belfast)
Their mother Agnes died on 21 August 1910 (aged 41) at Churchfield, Holywood.
Norman Hill Woods was educated at Skegoniel School in Belfast and at Upper Sullivan School in Holywood and, prior to the outbreak of the Great War, he worked as an insurance clerk in the London and Lancashire Fire Insurance Company, 14 Donegall Square West, Belfast.
In November 1914 Norman Hill Woods enlisted in the 6th Black Watch Territorials (No. 2540) with whom he served until May 1915 when he was promoted to a commission with the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers in 49th Brigade of the 16th (Irish) Division. After a spell of duty in Londonderry he went to the Western Front on 15 July 1916. In March 1917 he was awarded the Military Cross for conspicuous gallantry in action – ‘He carried out a successful raid with marked ability and captured two unwounded prisoners. Although heavily engaged during the retirement from the enemy’s trench he brought his party back with no casualties’.
Lieutenant Norman Hill Woods MC was 24 when he was killed in action on 16 August 1917 at the Battle of Langemarck and he has no known grave.
Lieutenant Norman Hill Woods MC is commemorated on Holywood and District War Memorial and in First Holywood Presbyterian Church.