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After the Affair at Lahej,¹⁹ he went to Mhow in India but later volunteered to go to Mesopotamia and transferred, with others, to the South Wales Borderers, 4th Battalion in October 1916 and they were involved in fighting there from February 1917 onwards. It was there during a big attack on 30th April 1917 that he was killed in action, as was his friend from Llanfrynach, Private John Walters. Other Brecon men died that day in the fighting including Private Charles Edward Bather, Private William John Jenkins and Lieutenant Stephen Best.
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19
See page 216
Private William Edwin Morgan
South Wales Borderers 4th Battalion. service no. 27794
Killed in action in Mesopotamia on April 30th, 1917, aged 19
Commemorated at the Basra War Memorial, Iraq
Prior to joining the colours William worked at the fitting shops of Brecon and Merthyr Railway in Machen.
In October, 1914, when he was sixteen William enlisted in the Brecknockshire (Reserve) Battalion at Brecon, and went to Aden in early July 1915 with other troops to join the Brecknocks already there.
William was born in the Breconshire village of Llanspyddid in January 1898 the eldest child of William Morgan and Annie Elenore Morgan (nee Price). His father was born in the county and his mother in Radnorshire.
In 1901 when William was three the family was still living in the village at cottage number 4 and his father was a waggoner. By 1911 the family was living at Church Road, Llanfrynach and William, then thirteen, was a newsboy. His father was now employed by the Midland Railway as a coalman. Later they moved to Avenue Court, Brecon.