Battle of the Somme: 110th Anniversary

Jack Abbott Excerpts

Thursday 12th November 2026 Commons Chamber

[Jack Abbott (Ipswich) (Lab/Co-op)]

I thank the hon. Member for South West Devon (Rebecca Smith) for bringing this debate to mark the 110th anniversary of the battle of the Somme coming to an end. That is 110 years since young men from Ipswich, Suffolk and communities across Britain bravely went into battle, facing extraordinary danger in the service of their country, but many never came home. More than a century has passed, but the sacrifice that they made and the loss suffered by their families must never be forgotten.

For many men, the Somme would be their final battle. Back home in Ipswich and Suffolk, families waited for their fathers, sons, brothers and husbands to come home; instead, they were left with the devastating news of their deaths and the knowledge that the lives they had imagined for them and with them would never be lived. They were soldiers who answered their country’s call with extraordinary courage, but they were also young men with hopes, ambitions and their whole lives ahead of them. For so many, their lives were cut tragically short on the fields of Europe. For the families left behind in Ipswich, the war did not end when the guns fell silent; it ended with a telegram through the door, an empty chair at the dinner table or a photograph of a loved one who would never come home.

More than 100 men from Ipswich lost their lives during the Somme offensive—more than 100 families in our town were left to live with a grief that no passage of time could ever fully erase—and I want to put some of their names on the record today. Private Harold Bailey was just 19 years old when he was killed—an age at which so many young people begin their adult lives, make plans and dream of their futures. Private William Attewell was 21. Private Vivian Bradley was 19. Private Walter Fiddaman was also 19. Those young men served in the Suffolk Regiment and came from our town and our county. They grew up on our streets and belonged to our communities, but they never came home.

On 3 January 1916, the 7th Battalion, Suffolk Regiment took part in a devastating attack on Ovillers. The battalion suffered 470 casualties, including all its company commanders. Among the Ipswich men lost were Benjamin Baker and Arthur Holmes. Just 12 days later, on 15 July 1916, the 4th Battalion suffered more than 200 casualties during the fighting around Bazentin Ridge and High Wood. Seventeen Ipswich men lost their lives that day. Among them were Samuel Jennings, aged 19, and Robert Lloyd, aged just 18—a young man who had a whole life ahead of him. More than 1 million men were killed over the four-month period that the fighting raged, but every single one of those deaths was a life extinguished and a family devastated.

This week, I joined hundreds of people in Ipswich to pay tribute at Christchurch Park and the fields of honour in Ipswich Old Cemetery. As the “Last Post” sounded and our town fell silent, I thought about the young men from Ipswich who had been killed on the battlefield.

Ipswich and Suffolk have a proud and enduring history of service to our country, from the Suffolk Regiment on the Somme to the radar pioneers at Bawdsey. Our town and our county have given so much to the defence of our nation, but remembrance is not simply about pride and honour, as crucial as they are; it is about grief. It is about recognising the terrible human cost of war and understanding that the freedoms we enjoy today were secured by people who paid such a heavy price that we can scarcely comprehend. They gave their tomorrow for our today, and we will remember them.