Wren, Sidney John

Driver

No. T/169758, Royal Army Service Corps

Died as the result of an accident on Thursday 21 November 1940 (aged 23)

Buried:

Holywood Cemetery, Co. Down (Protestant Ground Collective Grave 1263)

Commemorated:

Commonwealth War Graves Commission

BIOGRAPHY

Driver Sidney John Wren was a son of George and Annie Wren (nee Brand) of Stansted, Essex.  Their marriage was registered in the second quarter of 1913 in Bishops Stortford, Hertfordshire and Sidney’s birth was registered there in the first quarter of 1917.  Sidney John Wren was born on 22 January 1917 and in civilian life worked as a grocery shop assistant and van driver.

George Wren worked as a farm labourer and tractor driver and he and Annie had at least three children:

Cyril G. (born 1914)

Sidney John (born 22 January 1917)

Dorothy M. (born 1920).

The death of Driver Sidney John Wren (No. T/169758), who was unmarried, was reported in the 30 November 1940 edition of the County Down Spectator under the headline Tragic Death of Three Soldiers.  Three young soldiers were killed in Clandeboye Camp, Ballyleidy when trees fell across huts in which they were sleeping.  They were Driver George William Evens (aged 23) from Plymouth; Private Derek Rodney Swift (aged 24) from Blackpool and Driver Sydney John Wren (aged 23) from Stansted in Essex.  The roof of the hut in which Private Swift was sleeping caved in and pinned him to the bed.  To release him his comrades used a heavy jack to raise the fallen roof and hacksaws to cut down the bed.  He suffered severe head injuries and was dead when his comrades got him out.  Driver Wren and Driver Evens were crushed by fallen debris and both were asphyxiated.  Driver Sydney John Wren was 23 when he died, and he was buried in Holywood Cemetery.  His CWGC headstone bears the inscription:

REST IN PEACE

Two other men were buried in this collective grave – Fusilier Frederick Bloomfield and Rifleman John McFarlane.