Philcox, CE

Lieutenant Cecil Ernest Philcox

Cecil was born on September 8^th 1895, the third, and youngest, son of timber merchant Alfred Philcox and his wife, Alice. He joined the College in the early summer of 1909, having been at Herne Bay College in Kent for the previous two years. He was at Dulwich for the next three years, before leaving in the spring of 1912 in order to take up a position with his father’s firm of timber merchants.

In September 1914, the month after war had been officially declared, Cecil signed up for service, at first as a member of The Rangers (12^th Battalion London Regiment), before transferring to the Inns of Court O.T.C. in February 1915. That summer he took up his commission, in the South Staffordshire Regiment, and proceeded to the front for the first time with his new regiment the next summer, in June 1916. A month later, having distinguished himself in the fighting around High Wood on the Somme, he was promoted to Lieutenant and that November was appointed the Battalion Bombing Officer. Between the summer of 1916 and the summer of 1917, he was engaged in near constant combat, taking part in many of the heaviest and most important engagements up and down the Western Front, ultimately being awarded the M.C. as a result of his action in May 1917. Mere weeks after this he was supervising bombing practice behind the lines when he was caught in an accidental grenade explosion, suffering severe head wounds inflicted by shrapnel. Three days after sustaining his injuries he died as a result, on May 24^th 1917, at the age of just 21.