Notes
The Bradford Grammar School website (see References) states: 'Leopold was the son of a German Jewish settler in Bradford in the 1860s, Bernhard Nathan from Magdeburg in Prussia. Bernhard was a cloth merchant, who became a partner in the company of Ferdinand
Heilborn of East Parade, Bradford. He clearly intended to remain in Britain, becoming naturalized in 1868. In 1874 he married Helene Seeman, also from Germany, and they settled in Manningham where they lived for the next half century. Over a period of twenty years Bernhard and Helene had five children, of whom Leopold was the youngest and their third son born in 1894. It has been said that the ‘Bradford Jews were noted for their assimilation and lack of religious life’. Both Bernhard’s daughters married at St. Barnabas’ Church, Heaton, while he joined the Freemasons, and was a member of two Bradford lodges.
Leopold was at Bradford Grammar School for ten years, commencing when he was nine. He was a talented student in a wide range of subjects, but it was in the Classics that he excelled. In his later years he played rugby at half-back for the First XV and he was a batsman in the First XI. He spent two years in Fifth Classical and three in 6th Classical before winning an Open Classical Scholarship to Trinity Hall, Cambridge in 1913. It is doubtless this that led the author of the ‘Cambridge Letter’ in The Bradfordian (March 1914) to write cryptically, ‘Nathan tries to pass for a B.A. in his fifth year, but his fresh and innocent countenance belies his long gown and irreproachable square.’
It is likely that Leopold joined the O.T.C. at Cambridge, and during the Michaelmas Term 1914 he gave up his studies at Cambridge to obtain a commission. On 11th January 1915 he was gazetted as Second Lieutenant and was posted to the 10th Battalion Duke of Wellington’s Regiment at Halifax. In August, Nathan was sent to France and subsequently was transferred to the 8th Battalion, joining them at Suvla Bay, Gallipoli, on 6th October.
He served there until the evacuation in December, and he was then in Egypt, until the 11th Northern Division were transferred to France, arriving at Marseilles on 1st July 1916.
After a fortnight holding trenches near Arras, the 8th Battalion moved to the Somme where they prepared for an attack on 14th September. At 6.30 p.m. two companies each from 8th Duke of Wellington’s and 9th West Yorkshire Regiments assaulted a German strongpoint called the ‘Wonder Work’ and a stretch of Hohenzollern Trench, south of Thiepval. The
objectives were seized within ten minutes and the British dug in forty yards beyond. Communication trenches were immediately constructed back to the previous front line. The next day, German counterattacks were beaten off suffering heavy losses. Although this was a complete, if limited, success it was at a price—the 8th Battalion lost eight officers and 250 other ranks killed and wounded. Among the former was Leopold Nathan. His body remained on the battlefield, over which there was further heavy fighting to come, so he has no known grave and his name is recorded on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing.
Although his son fell fighting for Britain, Bernhard was debarred from attending Masonic meetings from June 1915 until 1927 as he was of enemy country birth. He did not rejoin his lodge.'