Person    | Male  Born 13/8/1904  Died 13/6/1917

Died aged twelve years. Andrew Behan has kindly carried out some research on this young boy. Edwin Cecil William Powell was born on 13 August 1904 in Poplar, a son of Richard Henry Frank Powell and Jane Elizabeth Powell née Galvin. His father was a Engineers Labourer. On 7 September 1904 he was baptised at St Stephen's Church, Poplar, and the family is recorded as living at 1 Castor Street, Poplar. The 1911 census shows that they were living at 31 Castor Street, Poplar and that his parents by then had had 11 children, six of whom were still alive. When he was 7 years old his father died. He attended Upper North Street School, Poplar and died here, aged 12 years, on 13 June 1917 as a result of a bomb from a German aeroplane that killed a total of 18 children. He was buried on 20 June 1917 in a mass grave at the East London Cemetery and Crematorium, 260a Grange Road, Plaistow. An older brother, Frank Alfred Henry Powell, was killed in action two months later on 12 August 1917 whilst serving as a Lance Corporal in the 10th Battalion, Essex Regiment in France.

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