Remembering the Veterans: The Three Golfing Cottrell Brothers, KIA

Harry, William, and Albert Cottrell

By James Patton 

In 1911 the large Cottrell family were living in Guiseley, West Yorkshire. They were not locals by origin; indeed the ten children were born in places as far apart as Dublin and Derby, Kildare and Kilkenny, Plymouth and Leeds, which reflected the father’s profession as a regular soldier in the British Army.

Band Sergeant Henry Cottrell of the Sherwood Foresters (Notts and Derby Regiment) was awarded the Long Service and Good Conduct Medal (LS&GC) on 1 January 1898 and quickly found employment in civilian life as an attendant at the West Riding County Lunatic Asylum, Menston. The family put down roots, and the older children found work in the local mills.

Remarkably, three of the five sons in the family became golf professionals: William at Otley, Albert at Bradford, and Harry at Ulverston. William was clearly a talented player. “Against the biggest field on record, and in such conditions of weather as for their badness were almost unique,” William played in the British Open Championship in June 1913. His partner in the first round was John J. McDermott (1891–1971), an American from Atlantic City, NJ, who had won the U.S. Open in 1911 and 1912, the youngest player ever to do so. William failed to make the second round, but McDermott went on to take fifth place overall. The American was clearly impressed with the 20-year-old Guiseley man, for within six months, William was appointed the professional at the Plymouth Country Club in Massachusetts.

Meanwhile, Albert, had moved to the golf club at Le Touquet in France, but as soon as war was declared, he and Harry enlisted together in the new 9th (Service) Battalion of their father’s old outfit. In July 1915, they embarked for Gallipoli with the 35th Brigade, 11th  (Northern) Division, landed at Suvla Bay on 7 August, and in the 9 August attack on Chocolate Hill both brothers were killed. American Golfer magazine carried a special feature about them:

TWO PROFESSIONALS, brothers, have made the saddest and most glorious sacrifice in the war. Harry and Albert Cottrell were professionals respectively at Ulverston in Cumberland and Le Touquet in France, and when the war began they met and decided that they would both join the Sherwood Foresters, to which regiment their father had belonged. So they did, and in due course they went out to the war together. They went to the Dardanelles. Harry became a sergeant and Albert a corporal, and they kept together. In action Harry was wounded, and his brother went to his assistance and began dressing the wound. While he was doing so he was shot in the head and died soon afterwards, and Harry, while attending to him, was shot a second time, and this time fatally. This surely is one of the strangest, saddest tragedies that have been enacted out by those dreadful Dardanelles, and the professional golfers may well claim it for the honour of their kind. Shortly before he left England brave Harry Cottrell said to a friend, "If I have to go under, I hope I shall die game, for the sake of the profession!" And very game did this hero die.

The Cottrell Family Memorial in
Guiseley Cemetery

Neither Harry nor Albert has a marked grave, although their remains may lie in a mass grave at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) Green Hill Cemetery. Both are commemorated on the CWGC Helles Memorial to the Missing, Panels 150–152. The Cottrell family grave in Guiseley Cemetery records the deaths of the two brothers at Gallipoli and also lists William as “killed in France October 1918.” William’s name is also on the memorial inside the lych gate at St. Oswald’s, the Parish Church, but no record of him can be found on the lists of the CWGC or the records of Soldiers Died. The answer to this puzzle lies far away.

Green Hill Cemetery, Gallipoli
Final Resting Place of Albert and Harry

William registered for the draft in the U.S. on 5 June 1917, even though he was not a U.S. citizen. He then enlisted in the army on 28 March 1918, giving his home as his sister Christina’s address in New Jersey. His training was brief, as he was a last-minute addition to Co. M, 58th Infantry, 4th Division on 1 May 1918. Mere days after their arrival in France, they were loaned to the French and saw action at Chouy and Hill 172.  Their next stop was the St. Mihiel Salient, where they attacked the west face on 12 Sept. Quickly shifted to the Meuse Argonne, William’s company was a part of the attack on the Bois de Ogons on 27 Sept. and the subsequent attack on the Bois de Fays on 4 Oct. In spite of heavy shelling and night raids, the 8th Brigade held this position until 9 Oct., and during this period Pvt. William Cottrell was killed in action. He is buried in the ABMC Meuse-Argonne Cemetery at Romagne-sous-Montfaucon, Plot F, Row 25, Grave 37.

William's Burial Certificate

In 1919 the American Golfer magazine included a second account of “The Family of Professional Golfers who have died for the honour of the game” accompanied by the splendid photograph at the top of the page.