Driver

Driver (Dvr) was a military rank used in the British Army and the armies of other Commonwealth countries. It was equivalent to the rank of Private.

The rank was initially used in the Royal Artillery for the men who drove the teams of horses which pulled the guns. It was phased out after the First World War (when all Royal Artillerymen of the lowest rank were redesignated as Gunners). It was also used in the Royal Australian Artillery and Royal Canadian Artillery.

It was also used by all the Private-equivalents of the Royal Army Service Corps and later the Royal Corps of Transport, no matter what their trade. When the RCT amalgamated to form the Royal Logistic Corps in 1993 the rank finally disappeared from the British Army.

Driver Percy Glifford Snoxell

Submitted by Deejaya on

Pte Snoxell enlisted at Luton and served in the Royal Horse Artillery before joining 68th Battery, Royal Field Artillery. He was killed in action at an unspecified location in France on August 26th, 1914

Percy was the eldest son of Albert (b 1868) and Annie (b 1870) who were in lodgings in Inkerman Street at the time of the 1891 Census, a year after his birth. Albert is described as a straw hat bleacher originally from Totternhoe and Annie as a straw hat finisher born in Luton.

Driver Jesse Bertran Hammett

Submitted by KarenC on

Jesse Bertran Hammett was born in 1895 in Luton to Walter & Emily.

In 1911 he is 16 years old & living at 169 Park street with his parents, bother Cyril 13, his brother-in-law Frederick Harding & they have a lodger Robert Chivers.

Jesse is working as an order boy in the hat trade. His brother-in-law is a clerk & his mother is a machinist, also in the hat trade. His father & lodger are general labourers in the building trade.

On 20th January 1915 Jesse joined the Royal Engineers as a driver, then was sent to France.

Driver Harry Reed

Submitted by reedy52 on

Harry Reed was my Grandfather who was born in Alford, Lincolnshire in 1892 & was the youngest of four children.  He married my Grandmother, Gertrude Goodrick, who also came from Lincolnshire in Kilburn, London in June 1916.  They moved to Luton & were living at Stopsley Farm where he was employed as a Rough Rider (horse breaker) at the time of his call up in November 1916.

Driver Ernest Ethelred Barrett

Submitted by magistrate46 on

My first cousin twice removed (his father, John Barrett, was a brother of my great-grandmother), Ernest Ethelred Barrett had been a house-painter at the time of the 1911 census of Luton, aged 16, living in the family home at 53 Hibbert Street. He enlisted on 9 September 1914 into the Royal Engineers, as a Sapper, (Army No. 1515) and was posted to E.A. Division RE. He later became a Driver, (Army No. 524183) and served throughout the Great War.

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