Second Lieutenant, Lincolnshire Regiment
Born: February 25th 1895
Died: July 3rd 1916
Age at Death: 21
Killed in action, nr. Fricourt France, July 3rd 1916
Son of Dobree C. Wickham, Assistant Master of Brighton College. Brother to John Dobree Durrell Wickham (Ju./Sc. 1892-1903).
A donation to the memorial statue has been made in honour of this soldier by Alan Seager (Ch. 1948-53).
Obituary, Brightonian XV December, 1916
Lister Durrell Wickham was at Mr. Frank Gresson's preparatory school, The Grange, Crowborough, and entered Chichester House, Brighton College, in 1908, leaving it in 1913. He was a Prefect, and in the First Football XI. He was for a few months in the Borneo Company in the City, and joined the Inns of Court O.T.C., with which Corps he was training when war broke out. He immediately applied for and obtained a Commission in the 6th Battalion of the Lincolnshire Regiment, and was shortly promoted full Lieutenant. In the following March he was made Captain, a fortnight after his 20th birthday, and on July 1st of the same year proceeded with his regiment to Gallipoli, when he was invalided home with acute dysentery. After a short sick leave he rejoined at Brocton Camp, and early in May, 1916, was sent to the West Front attached to the 7th Lincolns. He was killed on July 3rd, at he beginning of the Battle of the Somme, leading his Company into action against a strong German position near Fricourt, which they took. He was wounded as they were mustering for the attack, and twice in the charge, but went on unflinchingly, and was finally killed by a shell in the German trench. An officer writes:- "His example was extremely fine, and will never be forgotten by any of the men."
Captain Lister Durrell Wickham
Lister, known as Ben, Wickham was born on 25 February 1895 in Brighton, Sussex. He was the youngest child of Dobree Wickham, housemaster of the College’s Junior House, and his wife Madelaine (née Durrell). Wickham was a pupil at the College long after his father had retired and moved to Crowborough, Sussex. At the College Wickham played for the 1st XI football team, the team report stating that although he had ‘very little natural skill at the game’ he had ‘made himself useful by sheer hard work’ and was a Sergeant in the school OTC and a school prefect. After leaving the College he worked in London for The Borneo Company, which oversaw mining and mineral exploration in what is now Sarawak, Malaysia and in February 1914 joined the Inns of Court OTC.
On the outbreak of war Wickham received a commission in the 6th Battalion, Lincolnshire Regiment, which, after training on Salisbury Plain, embarked for Gallipoli on 30 June 1915. Having fought with the battalion for three weeks Wickham contracted dysentery and on 29 July was invalided home. After some months’ recovery and further time on ‘general duties’ at home, presumably staffing the Lincolnshire’s regimental depot, hemarried Marguerite Dickinson, a musician and professional singer, in Grantham on 10 May 1916, before returning to active service. He was promoted to Captain and attached to the 7th Lincolnshires, which formed part of 17th Division. After preliminary training the battalion was moved to Morlancourt on 30 June and, along with the rest of 17th Division, took part in the first day of the Somme offensive the following day. The battalion was initially held in reserve but was ordered into action in the evening of 1 July 1916 and occupied Fricourt with relatively little loss the following day. However on 3 July, Wickham’s command, A Company, 7th Lincolnshires, was ordered to take part in an attack on ‘Crucifix Trench’ near Mametz. The attack was, overall, quite successful by the standards of the Somme offensive as 600 Germans were taken prisoner in exchange for only 180 British casualties. However, after suffering a minor leg wound at the start of the action Wickham was killed by machine gun fire two hours later, just as the enemy position was being taken.
Wickham has no known grave but is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France. In addition, his widow Marguerite, who later remarried, commemorated him by adopting ‘Lister’ as her stage name. His elder brother, John (‘Jack’) Wickham, was also killed in the war.
The North family bestowed a great favour on the College in June 2015 when they arranged for the medals of Lister Durrell Wickham to be donated to the College.