Sgt. Percy Allsup
Percy Allsup enlisted, under-age, in Chorley on the 19th September 1914. Percy was held back from the 1st July attack but still sustained a slight injury from artillery fire when the Battalion’s reserves were sent forward in the evening to man what remained of the British front line.
Aside from a week’s home leave in January 1917, Percy saw continuous service with the Pals until he was sent home to recover from the effects of mustard gas in early August 1917. After hospitalization in Scotland, Percy passed through Sergeants’ School before returning to the Western Front. In the remaining months of the war, he survived a wound from machine gun fire sustained while on night patrol.
Like his brother James, Percy lived at home in Clayton-le-Woods and worked pre-war at Swansey Mill in Whittle-le-Woods.
He was demobilised from the Army on the 7th March 1919 and then worked as a Policeman in Blackburn. Percy was born in Brindle on the 28th July 1897 being baptised by Rev. Kinton Jacques in Brindle St. James’s Church on the 12th September. He married Annie Weaver (a Leyland girl) in January 1922 at St. Andrew’s Church in Leyland and emigrated with his mother and two other brothers (who had also served in the war), joining brother James in Pawtucket.
Percy made return trips to the U.K. in June 1930, June 1957 and sometime in the summer of 1965; he died in America in 1966.
