Haddon, V

2nd Lieutenant Vernon Haddon

Vernon was born on December 8th 1897, the elder of two sons, and second of four total children, born to export merchant Benjamin Haddon and his wife, Fanny. He joined the College from the Prep at the beginning of 1911, a path which was later to be followed by his younger brother Norman, and went on to be a pupil for two years. At the end of 1912 he left to pursue an education abroad, attending a school in Godesberg, Germany, for the next eighteen months or so.
When war was declared in the summer of 1914 Vernon was back in England and, despite being underage, signed up as a Private in the 20th (Public Schools) Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers. He went with the unit over to France for the first time in November 1915, still a month short of his eighteenth birthday, and spent the following summer serving through most of the Somme campaign. In the October of 1916 he was granted a commission, as a result spending several months back in England undergoing training at Cambridge University. The following May he returned to France as a 2nd Lieutenant, still in the Royal Fusiliers, albeit now with the 11th Battalion. After an engagement at Glencorse Wood, near Ypres, on August 10th 1917, he was declared to be missing and, although no remains were ever formally identified, is presumed to have died on that date.