Biography:
William Aubrey Bowers was born 22 January 1887, the son of William Eli Bowers J.P and Alice, nee Blagg, of Caverswall Castle, Stoke-on-Trent.
He came to Winchester College from Sandroyd School in September 1900 and was in G House, Sergeant's. He became Head of his House and a member of Senior Divison, Sixth Book; he played in Commoner VI in 1905 and kept goal for the Soccer XI in his last two years.
Aubrey left Winchester in the summer of 1906 and went up to New College, Oxford later that year. He graduated with Honours in Classics and History.
Soon after leaving Oxford he was elected a member of Staffordshire County Council and when war broke out obtained a commission in the 5th Batttalion of his county regiment. He died on 2 July 1916, at Walincourt, aged 29, of wounds received the day before at Gommecourt in the first hours of the Battle of the Somme. He had been assisting one of his men carry a load of barbed wire when a shell exploded overhead and he was hit by shrapnel.
Aubrey married Miss Vera Aimee Latham in 1913 and left one daughter, Penelope, born in January 1915. His widow erected a plaque and new choir-stalls in his memory in St Peter's Church, Caverswall.
In 2008 the BBC Stoke and Stafford produced an article for their War Stories website, featuring Lt Bowers. It can be accessed here: www.bbc.co.uk/stoke/content/articles/2008/07/29/bowers_feature.shtml