Several Dengates were injured in the line of duty. Cecil Walter Dengate (1898-1965), serving in the 9th Lancers was shot in the eye by a sniper and was subsequently invalided out (see above).

 

Frederick John Dengate (1895-1946) was admitted to hospital on several occasions during his time stationed in Alexandria, Egypt: 24th March 1917 wounded, 24th April 1917 diarrhoea, 9th December 1917 injury to right knee, 29th March 1918 gunshot wound to the thigh. He was eventually awarded the British War Medal and the Victory Medal.

 

William Henry Dengate (1881-1965) suffered an unfortunate gunshot wound to his right buttock on 15th September 1916, whilst serving in France with the 5th Oxford and Bucks Regiment. After treatment at the Buckinghamshire Special Military Hospital he was discharged, being ‘no longer physically fit for war service’.

 

Thomas Frederick Dengate (1895-1979), volunteered as a bombardier with the Royal Field Artillery on 7 September 1914 was hospitalised on 1st July 1918 but made a full recover and remained with the army until 1926.

 

Frederick Charles Dengate (1892-1982) served with the 14th Battalion London Regiment at the rank of Private in India, South Africa and France. He suffered a gunshot wound to his shoulder on 6th September 1916 whilst in combat in France and was sent back to England to recover. His injuries did not deter him and he was promoted on 7th September 1917, to the rank of Corporal. He suffered another injury on 8th November 1918 whilst fighting in Valenciennes, France. His Medical Report noted, 'patient states that whilst making an attack, he was wounded by a hostile shell...removed from left upper thigh January 15th 1919’. He went on to make a full recovery and was demobbed on 4th M arch 1919 at London.

 

William Harold Dengate (1888-1932), a gunner with the North Scottish Royal Garrison Artillery was admitted to hospital on 31st October 1917 after suffering from a gas attack. He was sent home on the 4th November 1917 and did not return to active duty. He was described as a ‘steady, hard-working man.’ William Harold’s brother Alfred James Dengate (1886-1975) was also subjected to a gas attack whilst fighting in France with the Grenadier Guards. The attack occurred 27th January 1918, sending Alfred to hospital for more than four months. Others, such as thirty-six-year-old George David Dengate (1880-1950), serving with the 6th Cyclist Battalion Suffolk Regiment simply suffered from rheumatism.

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Sadly, but rather predictably, the war brought more than injury to the various branches of the Dengate family; four young Dengate men were killed fighting for their country. James Dengate, known as Jim, of Sedlescombe (1897-1917) joined the Royal Sussex Regiment and served in the 3rd company of the 1st Battalion, which spent all of the First World War on the North West Frontier of India. Jim's military service tragically ended in Karachi, Pakistan when he was killed on 14 September 1917, aged just 20 years. His family learned of the death via telegram whilst living at Brickyard Cottage, Sedlescombe and were deeply upset by his death. He was the third person in the family to be killed that year, after his two cousins Malcom and Edward Cecil McDougall (their mother was Harriet Agnes Dengate (1853-1933) and she lost two of her three sons in the war.

 

Jim's Dengates father, James was asked by the vicar of Sedlescombe Church to build the war memorial to the war dead, which he did with the help of his other son Francis William Dengate (1904-1979). Also in response to his grief, James was encouraged to take up the position of church grave-digger and sexton, which he did for many years, retiring as the church's last grave-digger.

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The below photograph of Jim has suffered from wear and tear over the years and was at some point touched up with a black painted outline. This portrait hung on his devoted sisters Nellie Margaret Dengate (1910-1994) and Rosa May Dengate's (1901-1989) wall until their deaths in the 1990s.