Biography:
James Howard Stables was born 27 Jun 1895, the son of the Reverend William Howard Stables, Vicar of St Chad's, Far Headingley near Leeds and Harriet Emily Stables, the daughter of the Reverend Francis Morse, Vicar of St Mary's, Nottingham.
He came to Winchester College in 1908 from Mr W Joyce's School at Reigate. James was in D House, Fearon's.
He left Winchester in 1913 for Christ Church, Oxford in 1913 and as soon as war broke out enlisted in the 6th Battalion, Hampshire Regiment. He accompanied them to India and later obtained a commission in the Indian Army Reserve of Officers, being attached to the Gurkha Rifles and saw service in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq).
Conditions were harsh, with plague, smallpox, cholera, malaria and dysentery all prevalent, with heat-stroke in temperatures mounting to 120 degrees F in the shade and very little clean water.
Stables fell, severely wounded, on 17 February 1917, during an unsuccessful attack at Sannaiyat, intended to break through the Turkish defences, and then to advance on Baghdad. He was left behind when the British withdrew and is presumed to have died in enemy hands. Several of his poems were published in the New Statesman.