Tillingham mum 'died of a broken heart' after son's death

Located in the churchyard of the parish church of St Nicholas, in Tillingham, the distinctive, ghostly white, standard CWGC Portland limestone headstone can be seen to the east of the chancel.

The top section seems normal enough. Rather than specific regimental insignia, however, there is an Army General Service badge in a roundel.

The service number and rank are given as “15766 Private” and the name “H. Sandford”.

Private Sandford, it tells us was in the “24th Training Reserve Bn. (Battalion)” and he died on “15th July 1917”, at the premature age of 18.

If that wasn’t sad enough, at the lower section of the headstone, below the cross, where you would normally find a personal inscription to the deceased, it reads “Also Mary Ann Sandford, Mother of the above. Died July 17th 1917. Age 57” – in other words, just two days after her son.

These lower inscriptions often provide the most intimate insight into a life lost, but I had never seen one before that includes a civilian family member.

The personal inscription was limited by Commission rules to 66 characters, charged at 3½ pence per letter.

In this case it equates to 56 characters, charged at 16 shillings and 4 pence – a considerable sum in those days.

The bittersweet bill was sent to “H. Sandford, Esq., South Street, Tillingham, Essex”.

Was that the grieving father and husband and what on earth had led to that double tragedy? I decided to go in search.

Based on young Henry’s age at death, I quickly discovered that he was born in Dengie in April 1899.

His father was indeed “H. Sandford”, for Henry Sandford senior.

His mother, included on the stone, was Mary Ann Sandford (née Morley).

The 1901 census shows them as living at Glebe Cottage, Dengie.

Henry senior was a 41-year-old “horseman on farm”, Mary was 40, and aged one, Henry junior was the youngest of then five children, including William, 15, Ada, 11, Grace, nine, and Alfred, four.

By 1911 the family had relocated to now long-gone Jerries Farm, Tillingham, just south-east of the church.

They are shown there in the 1911 census – Henry and Mary presiding over four sons - Alfred, 14, Henry (then 11 and “at school”), additions Charles, nine, and John, six.

It wasn’t that long after their move that the Great War broke out.

When Henry junior turned 18, he enlisted at Warley Barracks and was allocated to a “New Army” Training Battalion of the Duke of Cambridge’s Own – more commonly known as the Middlesex Regiment.

Until September, 1916, his Battalion had been the 14th (Reserve Battalion), but then converted to the 24th Training Reserve Battalion of the 5th Reserve Brigade, based at Shoreham.

He wasn’t in the Army for long and had probably only actually been in training for about three months when he became ill.

The next we hear about him is the record of his death on July 15, 1917, not at Shoreham, but at a hospital in Watford.

The cause is given as “pneumonia”, an unusual condition in high summer (although, granted, the summer of 1917 was marred by heavy rainfall).

However, it makes you wonder about the circumstances. Was it perhaps down to complications after a cold or flu in winter, or after getting wet on duty and struggling to get dry, or perhaps a bacterial complication following another illness?

Given Henry’s youthful age, his entry medical examination and his hitherto country lifestyle, it is odd, or at the least, very unlucky.

In any case, it looks like Henry died of natural causes.

It is difficult to know how the news was received by his mother back in Tillingham (along with the meagre service gratuity of £2), but the turn of events that followed shortly afterwards can but lead us to surmise.

Despite the size of her family, Henry, having been given his father’s first name, must have been particularly special to her.

A mother’s, often unconditional, love for a son can be deep-rooted and very special indeed.

It is enshrined in the mists of time, epitomised, some might say, through Mary’s love of Jesus.

That instinctive relationship seems to have been engrained in Mary Sandford’s love for Henry, for just two days later she followed him to the grave, died, it was said, of a “broken heart”.

Can you really die of a broken heart?

Even today the jury is out, but some have suggested that “takotsubo cardiomyopathy”, or a sudden weakness in the heart muscle, can occur after such an emotionally stressful event.

And, in the lyrics of the classic 1966 Jimmy Ruffin song, “What becomes of the broken-hearted, Who had love that's now departed?”.

In Mary and Henry Sandford’s case, they ended up being buried together, most unusually, jointly commemorated in Tillingham by the officialdom of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.