WWI REMEMBERED Tragedy for parents as surviving twin gave his all for Britain

FOLLOWING the cessation of hostilities at the Somme in November 1916, fighting on the Western Front had been relatively quiet. However, April 1917 would witness the start of the Battle of Arras.

From April 9 until May 16, 1917, British, Canadian, and Australian troops attacked German trenches near the French city of Arras.

The aim of the campaign was for the British Army to operate diversionary attacks near Arras to draw German troops away from the main target, which was the Chemin des Dames Ridge, near Champagne.

The intention was for the French Army to attack this area hoping for the much-needed breakthrough of the German lines.

Tragically, the success of both initiatives would prove costly.

At Arras the battle turned into a stalemate, with Britain sustaining 160,000 casualties and Germany 125,000.

Yet, at Chemin des Dames, the French would not only suffer 187,000 losses, but the whole offensive at the river Aisne eventually led to the mutinying of French troops on May 5. Consequently, Philippe Petain replaced Robert Nivelle as Commander in Chief of the French Army.

The offensive at Arras would claim the lives of three Porthcawlians, with one awarded the Military Medal.

Lieutenant Juan Manuel Aldana was born, one of twin boys on October 7, 1894, at Fulham, to Colombian father Abelardo Aldana, a foreign consul for a number of Latin countries in Cardiff, and Eliza Aldana (née Halladay), of Southampton.

The family had lived in Cardiff before moving to South Road, Porthcawl, before the war.

Aldana received his formative education at Llandaff Cathedral School and King’s School, Worcester, before going on to Keble College, Oxford. Sadly, his brother, Antonio, died after many years of ill-health, in 1913, aged 18.

After the outbreak of war in 1914, Aldana volunteered for the British Army and was commissioned into the Worcestershire Regiment as a temporary Second Lieutenant.

The regiment was posted to France in July 1916, where Aldana was wounded on October 20, 1916, at the Transloy Ridges, during the Battle of the Somme.

The following year, during the Arras Offensive, while in command of a company of the 4th Battalion, Worcestershire Regiment, 2nd Lieut Aldana was mortally wounded, as a result of a bombardment of German shells, and died the following day, April 21, 1917.

Lt Aldana is buried at Feuchy Chapel British Cemetery and also remembered on the family grave in Newton churchyard.

His commanding officer wrote: “His death day was the first time he was in the line in command of a company, and his work was thoroughly well done.”

After his death his parents moved to 32, Park Avenue, Porthcawl. Their previous address must have held too many sad memories.

Sub-Lieutenant Reginald Vaughan Cleves, Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, Hood Battalion, fell on April 23 at the Second Battle of Scarpe, in which his division captured Gavrelle.

Winston Churchill formed the Royal Naval Volunteer Division in 1914. Reginald had enlisted into the navy in 1912 as an apprentice, but with the onset of war, many recruits found themselves additional to the needs of the fleet.

As a result they hated the idea of being turned into soldiers and kept traditions by naming their naval brigades after famous admirals such as Drake, Nelson, Anson, Collingwood, Benbow, Hawke, Howe and Hood.

As the 63rd Division, they saw action on the Western Front, and by the end of the war had suffered casualties amounting to 1,965 officers and 44,829 other ranks, of which 445 officers were killed and 7,102 other ranks.

Sub-Lieut Cleves had been born in Cardiff on November 25, 1896 – the only child of Mr and Mrs Frederick Vaughan Cleves.

Before the war, the family had moved to 39 Fenton Place, Porthcawl, where, on June 3, 1916, the day the Venables Llewelyn Lodge was consecrated in New Road, Porthcawl, his father, Frederick, was installed as treasurer. Reginald himself was also initiated at the first meeting on July 1.

Aged 21 when he died, Sub-Lieut Cleves was buried at the Caberet Rouge, British Cemetery Souchez, Pas De Calais, France.

Tragically, on the day Reginald’s parents received the news of his death, they also received news of Frederick’s brother, 1st Officer Mercantile Marine, Charles Edward Cleves, who had drowned as a result of a German submarine attack on April 9.

His ship, the SS Torrington, was on a voyage from Savona to Barry when she was sunk by the German submarine U-55, 150 miles south west of the Scilly Isles. Thirty-four people perished that day.