Capt. Anthony William Greenwell LAX
Killed in Action 11 October 1916
Anthony’s parents were Dr William Greenwell LAX and Frances Annie Maud (nee Grayson). They were married at St Michael and All Angels Church, Bedford Park on 16 February 1892. William Lax had been educated at Trinity College Cambridge and had gone on to be a self-employed Army Tutor. At the time of the marriage, they were both residing in Bedford Park, William at 39 Priory Road (now Avenue) and Frances Annie at 28 Queen Anne’s Grove. Frances was one of seven children, the eldest of whom was John James Grayson whose son John Henry Grayson would lose his life during the Great War. John Henry’s name is also on the Bedford Park Memorial, presumably at the instigation of Frances or her parents.
Anthony was born in Fulham on 14 November 1892 and was baptised at St Andrew’s Church, Greyhound Road, Hammersmith on 20 December 1892. He was educated at St Paul’s School and later at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich. The fourth and final member of the family was Dorothy Maud Mary Greenwell Lax who was born in 1896. From the early days of family life they lived at Charleville House, 15 Charleville Road West Kensington, and remained there for many years. Anthony never lived in Bedford Park, but presumably had visited his grandparents there from time to time.
Assisted by his father Anthony became an Army Officer. He was gazetted 2nd Lieutenant, Royal Garrison Artillery on 19 July 1912, having passed out at the RMA Woolwich. He was 19 at commission.
Until the start of the Great War Anthony was serving in Jamaica. When war was imminent, he was recalled to Britain to be attached to 43rd Battery RGA, eventually seeing service in Greece and Thessaloniki, initially as a Lieutenant, and then (Temporary) Captain. He was killed in action on Wednesday 11th October 1916 at age 23. He is buried at Karasouli Military Cemetery, Polykastro, Kilkis, Central Macedonia, Greece.
Anthony is commemorated at the Military Academy, at St Andrew’s, Hammersmith and also at All Saints Parish Church, Whitstable in Kent. At St Andrew’s there is an individual brass plaque, as well as the church’s war memorial which was constructed in 1922 at the instigation and with the support of his father, William, by then a prominent member of that congregation. Anthony was posthumously mentioned in dispatches (London Gazette January 1917), and was awarded the 1914/15 Star, War and Victory medals.
Dorothy Maud (Anthony’s sister) at the age of 19 married a Lieut. William Mallalieu in 1915, and their son Leslie Greenwell Mallalieu was born in 1920 in Fulham but died the following year. He may have been their only child – Dorothy was only 37 when she died in Taunton in 1934.
Frances Lax, 12 years younger than her husband died at a Bristol Nursing Home in 1930 at age 58. William died 18 April 1940 aged 79.