WILLIAM THORNTON 

1702 Private / Orderly (1st Grade) William Thornton, St. John Ambulance Brigade, died of enteric fever at Elandsfontein, on March 1, 1901, aged 19. He is buried in Primrose Cemetery, Germiston, South Africa.

William Thornton was born in 1881, the second son of Alfred (1848 - 1905) and Margaret Jane nee Davis (1846 - 1938). When he was 9, the family was living at 44 Jackson Street, Crewe. His parents’ address in 1901 was 44, Farrington Street, Crewe.  

William was employed in Button's Borough Foundry, established by Walter Button, who died in 1888. They produced a wide range of iron goods in Crewe, such as boilers, pipes, lawn mowers, manhole covers and other street furniture.

   

William left Crewe for Aldershot on Christmas Eve, 1900, as part of the St John Ambulance Brigade. Ten weeks later, on 1st March 1901, William died of enteric fever (typhoid) at Elandsfontein. He was 19 years old. He is commemorated in the Primrose Garden of Remembrance, Germiston, and  in the Book of Remembrance at St George's Cathedral, Cape Town, South Africa. 

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His older brother Alfred (1877 - 1973) was born in Chester. In early 1901, Alfred married Edith Bostock  (1880–1935), and by the end of March 1901 was living with her parents at 95, Cemetery Road, Monks Coppenhall. In June 1921, he and Edith were at 15 Albert Street, Crewe. Edith and Alfred had daughters Hilda (1901–1986), Evelyn (1915–2020) and Irene (1921–2008) and a son named Wilfred (1908–1987).