Notes
The Roll lists his address as 10 Bread Street. (It also includes his brother Joseph Henry Smith, of the same address).
The Roll states that Drummer Walter W Smith died on 12/3/1915 [sic] as the result of 'wounds received at Neuve Chappelle'. However, CWGC has no trace of the death of any Drummer Smith of the Bedfordshire Regiment during WW1. The only two casualties named W Smith they record as having died in 1915 serving in the Bedfordshire Regiment both died in December of that year.
The Roll is in fact known to be wrong in stating that Walter died on 12/3/1915, as on 3/4/1915 the Peterborough Standard printed the following report:
'A Peterborough boy who was at Neuve Chapelle, and is now home on leave, is Drummer Walter Smith, of Bread Street, Fletton, son of the late Fireman G. Smith. Twenty-six years of age, Drummer Smith enlisted in the 2nd Bedfordshire Regiment eight years last January, and served with them at Malta and South Africa. It was only in September the Regiment came back from the latter place to go to the Front, and he visited his home on 24 hour's leave. At Neuve Chapelle, when in a reserve trench, a shell burst over them and a piece went through Smith's canvas equipment, bruising his chest, and making a severe cut across his nose. He was hit about 9.30 in the morning, and had to lie in the trench until 6.30 at night. He was then picked up by the ambulance and eventually brought to a hospital in Kent, whence he was allowed to come home on leave for 14 days on Monday. Smith has two other brothers serving, one in the Hunts Cyclist Battalion, and the other in the Peterborough Battery R.F.A. (T), while his elder brother served in the South African War'.
The Roll was therefore inaccurate in listing "Drummer Walter W Smith" as having died in March 1915, and was in fact mistaken in listing him as having died at all. (Fletton St Margaret's War Memorial includes the name of Walter's brother Joseph, but makes no mention of Walter).
It is possible that he was the Walter William Smith listed on Medal Rolls as 17140 in Bedfordshire Regiment, who later transferred to the Labour Corps under regimental number 222279. If so, he was discharged to Class Z 3/4/1919, i.e. he survived the war.
Walter's brother Joseph's entry in The Army Registers of Soldiers' Effects records that his mother Charlotte Smith was his legatee.
The birth of Walter William Smith was registered in the St Neots District in 1889. On the 1891 census he was living with his parents Charlotte and George Smith in St Neots; his place of birth was given as Eaton Socon. On the 1901 census he was living with his parents in Old Fletton. On the 1911 census Walter was serving as a Drummer with the 2nd Battalion Bedfordshire Regiment in Bermuda and Jamaica. On the 1921 Census his mother Charlotte was living at 10 Bread Street; he himself was living at 24 Palmerston Road with his wife Alma Jessie and their two children.
His marriage to Alma Jessie Braban was registered in Peterborough in 1916. On the 1939 Register they were living in Palmerston Road, Peterborough. The death of Walter William Smith, born 10/7/1889, was registered in Peterborough in 1972.