Second Lieutenant Charles Edward Hoare HALES (1905)

3rd (Reserve) Battalion, Wiltshire Regiment
Born 23 March 1886 in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire
Died 22 November 1917, aged 31
Buried in Bathwick (St. Mary the Virgin) Churchyard, Somerset. Also commemorated on a plaque in St Andrew’s Church, Charmouth, Dorset.

Charles Hales was the elder son of Major-General Arthur Hales of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, Commandant of the Straits Settlements, and Maria Frances, née Hoare.

He was educated at Sedbergh School, where he excelled on the firing range, being a marksman of the School’s Rifle Corps in 1904. He also participated in the school’s Debating Society, speaking on motions that ‘A knowledge of Greek is essential to good education’ and ‘Ghosts are to some extent real’. Whilst at Merton he took part in the 1907 Henley Regatta.

He was gazetted on 2 December 1914, but was later forced by ill health to relinquish his command, on 19 April 1916.

He died of illness contracted on active service, on 22 November 1917.