Henfield scout killed in battlewas only son in baking family

Young Harold Cruttenden was a keen scout in that first troop of 1907 and as a teenager joined the army and went off to the bloody fighting of the First World War – but never returned home to take over the family business. He died aged 20 on August 15, 1915, in Turkey during the Gallipoli campaign.

His heartbroken parents later gave up the bakery and tearooms, which is now Barnards, on the corner of Church Road and London Road.

Pictures of Harold as a Scout with that first troop – with others who later died in the same war with him – have become a symbol of all that is brave and noble in the young men of Henfield.

Their names live on for evermore on the memorial tablet set into the wall of Henfield Club at the entrance to Cagefoot Lane, opposite Stokes Newsagents.

Every Remembrance Sunday all the names of those Henfield boys who died in two world wars are read out as the parade stands silent.

Then the bugler plays Last Post before two minutes’ silence is followed by Reveille.

And the bugler is usually a former Henfield Scout . . .

Report and pictures by Mike Beardall, Oakfield Media.