War Memorial
Among the names recorded on the Chiddingstone Causeway War Memorial is that of Private Horace Henry Eade, a young man whose short life connected this corner of Kent with the battlefields of northern France.
Horace was born in the closing months of 1893 at Chiddingstone, the second son of Horace and Elizabeth Eade. The family home was at 7 Chiddingstone Causeway, in Tonbridge, Kent, placing the boy at the heart of the community he would one day be remembered by. As a young adult he moved away, taking up residence in Lewisham, and it was in London that he chose to enlist.
He joined the Royal Fusiliers, the City of London regiment, and was given the service number 21556. He served with A Company of the 9th Battalion and held the rank of Private. For his wartime service he earned a single campaign medal.
In the summer of 1916 the battalion was engaged on the Somme, and it was there that Horace lost his life. He was killed in action on 7 July 1916, at just 22 years of age. Like so many soldiers of that terrible campaign, he was buried where he fell, and no marked grave survives. His name instead appears among the missing at the Thiepval Memorial, which stands in the Somme region of France.
Horace had strong family roots in the area. His grandparents, Alfred and Mary Eade, lived out their final years locally: Mary died on 13 September 1914, aged 82, and Alfred followed on 11 September 1915, aged 83. They are buried in St Luke's Churchyard at Chiddingstone Causeway, and their grandson is commemorated on their gravestone.
His memory is kept alive in several places. Alongside the Chiddingstone Causeway memorial, Horace is also named on the Edenbridge Hospital War Memorial, ensuring that his sacrifice is not forgotten by the district he came from.