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The First World War saw four important hospitals - besides many smaller - posted at Birmingham: the 1st Southern General (3,500 beds) was in the university and other buildings, with a section at Stourbridge; the 2nd/1st Southern General (1,800 beds) in the Dudley Road Infirmary and in billets; the 1st Birmingham War Hospital (1,000 beds) at Rubery Hill Asylum and the 2nd Birmingham War Hospital (900 beds) at Hollymoor Asylum.

Military hospitals were at Birmingham again during the Second World War, including No.7 Canadian Hospital at Marston Green. Birmingham and Coventry were among the chief manufacturing areas producing materials for the war effort and were subjected to many devastating air raids during the Blitz of 1940-41.

Birmingham (Handsworth) Cemetery contains 104 scattered burials of the First World War and 99 of the Second World War. A Screen Wall commemorates those whose graves could not be individually marked.

One Officer who served with the Yorkshire Regiment is commemorated on a family headstone.

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2nd Lieutenant Leslie Melhuish. The Yorkshire Regiment, attached 2nd/5th Battalion KOYLI. Son of Robert Melhuish, of Northgate, Harborne, Birmingham, and the late Annie Melhuish. Enlisted in the 9th Bn. S. Staffordshire Regt. Killed 27 November 1917. Aged 21.
Commemorated on the CAMBRAI MEMORIAL, LOUVERVAL.
(Incorrectly shown on the Birmingham Hall of Memory commemoration as serving in the West Yorkshire Regiment.)
The following biographical notes are provided by Robert Coulson in his Biographies of Officers of the Yorkshire Regiment;-
"Leslie Melhuish enlisted in the 9th Battalion of the South Staffordshire Regiment at the onset of war and then spent time with the Machine Gun Corps.
He was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant and joined the Yorkshire regiment but was then attached to the 2/5th Battalion of the Kings Own Yorkshire Light Infantry.
2nd Lt Leslie Melhuish was killed in action aged 21 serving with the KOYLI on November 27th 1917 during the Battle of Cambrai.".
His Obituary in the Green Howards Gazette (XVI 299 7 (April 1918) can be read here.

IN LOVING MEORY OF
ANNIE
BELOVED WIFE OF ROBERT MELHUISH
WHO FELL ASLEEP NOV 1ST ... / AGED 62 YEARS
ALSO
LESLIE MELHUISH....
SON OF THE ABOVE
KILLED IN ACTION AT CAMBRAI NOV 27 1917
plus others (difficult to read)

Photo : Steve 120914

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