A ceremony on Thursday, January 11, will mark a century since the death of Askam soldier George Armstrong.

L/Cpl Armstrong is not named on the village war memorial but he is buried with a Commonwealth War Grave Commission headstone in St Peter’s Churchyard, Ireleth.

His sacrifice will be commemorated by the lighting of a candle at 6pm at the Askam and Ireleth War Memorial.

L/Cpl Armstrong was number R/6171 with the King's Royal Rifle Corps and died from war-related causes at the age of 38 on January 11 in 1918.

Members of Askam and Ireleth History Group have been researching the men named on the war memorial, or with strong links to the village, and holding a ceremony for each on the 100th anniversary of their death

He was born in 1880 in Cleator Moor and at the time of the 1891 census was aged 11 and living in the West Cumberland mining village with his parents Jonathan and Jane Armstrong.

Also there were his siblings Joseph, 10; Jonathan, eight; Henry, seven; Isabella, four; and his grandmother Isabella Mitchell, who was a widow.

Details of George’s life and army career have been difficult to find.

In 1895 he was a 14-year-old passenger on the SS Harlech Castle from Falmouth for Cape Town, South Africa.

Although George has no occupation given on the ship’s register, most of the other men on board are miners, heading for the gold mines in South Africa and Rhodesia.

When war broke out in Europe and an appeal was made for volunteers, George was one of the first to respond.

He was then at Gwanda mines, Rhodesia, and with several others, equipped themselves at their own expense and paid their passage to England.

They returned on the Steamship Kildonan Castle from Cape Town and the ship docked in Plymouth in the middle of October, 1914.

He joined the Army on December 20 and was attached to the King’s Royal Rifle Corps as a private and received training.

In an article in the Barrow News of November 18 in 1916 the soldier was suffering from malaria fever and was in hospital at Malta.

Malta was where soldiers were sent from Gallipoli and Salonika with wounds or illness.

It is likely that he was was with the 4th battalion King’s Royal Rifle Corps at Salonika from November 1915.

Prior to this, the battalion saw action in France at the 2nd battle of Ypres.

In December 1916 he was sent home on a hospital ship to England.

In the latter part of August 1917 George married Eleanor Smith in Bournemouth.

She was the daughter of Margaret Smith of 21 Dalton Road, Askam.

Eleanor was an Assistant Teacher and had two sisters Ada and Hannah.

George was discharged from the army and was in a hospital near Leeds for some time.

On January 11 in 1918 George died at the home of his mother-in-law with rheumatic fever.

He was given a military funeral and it was said that George was a genial friend with a big store of knowledge, and a fund of reminiscences which were full of interest.