Pte Reginald Stuart Stares, 14809, C Company, 12th West Yorkshire Regiment (Prince of Wales' Own), is recorded as killed in action at the battle of Loos in France on September 26th, 1915. He was posted missing following an engagement on September 27th.

Born in Luton in late 1892, he was the son of Londoner George Stares, who died in early 1913, and Martha Harriet, who died in early 1905. The couple had married at Lambeth in 1873, and George remarried in late 1905, his new wife being Sarah Ann Parcell.

At the time of the 1911 Census the family were living at 136 Wellington Street, Luton, but minus Reginald and his grown-up brothers and sisters. A new addition to the family was Hilda May, aged four.

Reginald had been apprenticed to hairdresser Mr Gillman in Lea Road, Luton, and in 1911 was an assistant hairdresser at Kempston. He then moved to Dewsbury in Yorkshire to work, and it was there he enlisted in August 1914. He was briefly billeted with his battalion in Leighton Buzzard before they went to Halton Camp and Witley Camp in Surrey and finally were drafted to France in September 1914.

Official notification that he was missing was received by his brother Herbert at 63 Cambridge Street, Luton, in November 1915.