Family :

Service Life:

Campaigns:

• The First World War 1914-1918, World-wide.

The use of aircraft as a platform for observation, also gave rise to strategic bombing raids on military and civil targets

Detail :

As a 56 year old linen draper it is unlikely that George would have volunteered for the military nor conscripted or accepted at this stage in the war. He was, however, killed as a civilian in an act of war.

Hertfordshire Life published the story 100 years on under the headline "HERTFORD'S ZEPPELIN TERROR":

"On the night of October 13 1915, England experienced one of the worst air raids of the First World War, when German Zeppelin airships flew in formation with the intention of bombing London.

Oberleutnant-zur-See Werner Peterson, in charge of Imperial Navy Zeppelin L16, was part of a group of five airships which arrived off the coast of Norfolk at around 7.30pm. They took their bearings from Cromer and Great Yarmouth, then waited for it to get dark. At a height of around 6,500 feet they set off for their target. Only one, L15, found London. Peterson and his crew mistook the curve of the river Lee in Hertfordshire and lights from warehouses along it for the Thames and the East End of London and dropped the craft’s load of 48 incendiary and explosive bombs before returning home, where they reported a successful mission.

The first bombs fell in Hertford at around 10pm on The Folly road. The Zeppelin’s course then took it over Bull Plain. The noise drew people into the streets; four men came out of Lombard House (the then Conservative Club) to see what was happening. They were all killed. The explosions in Bull Plain also severely damaged several houses and killed a four-year-old boy in his bed.

Old Cross was hit next with incendiaries which damaged three houses and left several people badly burned. Houses were also damaged at nearby North Road where the only military casualty of the raid was hit and killed, Acting Bombadier Arthur John Cox of the Norfolk Regiment.

A high explosive bomb fell immediately outside the gates of Hertford County Hospital and broke 200 panes of glass and around a quarter of the iron railings surrounding the building were shattered. Some of the iron railings came through the front windows of the hospital building. Two workmen, standing in Garrats Mill Yard across the road from the hospital, were killed.

Overall, 71 people were killed across London and East Anglia that night and a further 128 injured – the heaviest casualty list from an air raid during the war. Seventeen of the dead were soldiers and sailors. The nine people killed in Hertford, unusually, are recorded on the town’s war memorial. They are James L. Gregory, 55, organist at All Saints and professor of music; Ernest Thomas Jolly, 27, bank cashier; John Henry Jevons, 67, borough surveyor of Hertford; George Cartledge, 56, linen draper; Charles Waller, 43, labourer; Arthur Hart, 51, labourer; George Stephen Game, 4; Charles Spicer, 30, labourer; Arthur James Cox of Yarmouth, bombardier in the Norfolk Regiment, stationed in Hertford.

People flocked to Hertford the day after the raid as rumours spread that the town had been wiped off the map, and extra police were summoned to maintain order."

See more at: Hertfordshire Life.

Probate shows: CARTLEDGE George of 28 Fore-street Herftord Hertfordshire died 13 October 1915 at Bull Plain Hertford Probate London 14 December to Marth Cartledge widow. Effects £11359 0s 1d.

George is commemorated on the Hertford War Memorial.

Bro. Cartledge was a civilian killed alongside Bro. Gregory of Hertford Lodge in the Zeppelin raid on Bull Plain Hertford where they had been in the Conservative Club. The province lost a Prov Organist and the lodge a WM.

Masonic :

Worshipful Master.

In the contribution records of the Lodge at the United Grand Lodge of England it shows that a 46 year old Draper resident at 28 Fore Street, Hertford was initiated in 1906. He is listed in the 1921 book and 1933 scroll with no military rank. No war service is shown in the 1910-1921 ledger and the final annotation is that he "Died 15.10.15."

Source :

The project globally acknowledges the following as sources of information for research across the whole database:

• The Commonwealth War Graves Commission
• The (UK) National Archives
• Ancestry.co.uk - Genealogy, Family Trees & Family History online
• ugle.org.uk - The records of the United Grand Lodge of England including the Library and Museum of Freemasonry

Additional Source:

• Founder Researchers : Paul Masters & Mike McCarthy
• Researcher : Bruce Littley