Guardsman Arthur Kenneth Cates
1st Battalion Scots Guards Regiment
Killed in Action
Date of Birth: 28 December 1884
Place of Birth: Teddington, Middlesex
Date of Death: 22 June 1918
Buried: Remembered at St Amand British Cemetery, Pas de Calais and on Shaldon War Memorial.
Awarded the 1914-15 Star, the British War Medal and the Victory Medal
Guardsman Arthur Kenneth Cates age 34. Born 28 December 1884, Teddington, Middlesex.
He was the only surviving son of George Frederic Cates, P&O Coy's Service, by his wife Mary Caroline (nee Paine) of Hayes Barton Shanklin, Isle of Wight.
The 1891 census finds him living at Glenside, Shaldon, with his mother and siblings.
Glenside, Ringmore Road, Shaldon
Arthur was educated Myton, Warwickshire and on HM Training Ship Worcester.
By 1901 his mother, now widowed, has moved the family to Chiswick and Arthur is recorded as a stock brokers clerk.
He subsequently travelled to Canada on 6 November 1907 and was at various branches of the Canadian Bank of Commerce.
Following the outbreak of war he returned to England and enlisted in Liverpool on 6 January 1915.
He served with the Expeditionary Force in France and Flanders from September 1915, was wounded in July 1917 and invalided home.
Sots Guards Regiment
cap badge
Returning to France Private Cates was employed in the Trench Mortar Battery with 1st Battalion Scots Guards, service number 12811, and was accidentally killed on 22 June 1918.
Remembered at St Amand British Cemetery, Pas de Calais and on Shaldon War Memorial.
His Captain wrote: "Your son was one of the most trustworthy and valuable men in my battery, and I have always had the greatest respect and looking for him. The whole battery feels his loss deeply".
Lieut Ball (Grenadier Guards): "Your son was on good terms with everyone in the battery, and was one of the best men we had; in addition he was a fearless soldier and never shirked his duty".
