Frank Watkiss Private 40029 - 1st Bn. North Stafford Regiment Died of wounds on Sunday 16th September 1917 age 23 Buried in Knightley Churchyard, Knightley, Gnosall, Stafford Frank Watkiss was born in Gnosall early 1894 to farmer Henry Watkiss from Cerry Hill, Malpas, aged about 39, and Rachel Hannah nee Willcock from Great Haywood, 35. He was baptised at St Lawrence, 21st Jan 1894; it was stated his father was a farmer at Knightley. The 1901 census has the family at Yew Tree Farm, Knightley, which Henry’s mother Frances had previously farmed until her death in 1889. Frank had three sisters, Frances, Rachel Harriett and Bertha, and an older brother Henry. By1911 the family had moved to Cowley, where Henry was a farmer and the two boys (19 and 17) were listed as “farmer’s son working on farm” Frank, now 5’7½”, enlisted in the 6 th  Bn. of the North Stafford Regiment (Prince of Wales’s Regiment) on 25 Nov. 1915. By the time of his death he was in the 1 st  Battalion. He died of wounds at a hospital near Brighton on Sunday 16th September 1917, age 23 and is buried in the Churchyard at Knightley His family received the Victory and British War medals on his behalf.
Knightley Churchyard, Knightley Frank Watkiss was buried next to his grandmother Frances Watkiss west of the church in Knightley Churchyard, Knightley. The inscription has “Frank WATKISS 1st North Staffordshire Regt s/o H.& R.H. WATKISS Cowley, Gnosall/died 16 Sept 1917, of woundes received/ in action near Ypres, aged 23”. His family received the Victory and British War medals on his behalf. He was listed as the “son of Henry and R.H. Watkiss of Cowley House Farm, Cowley, Gnosall”.