Herbert Dean Cowley was born in Rawtenstall, Lancashire in 1891 to Herbert & Margaret.

In 1911 aged 20 he is working as an apprentice photographer & living with his family at No 61 Brook Street, Luton.

His father Herbert is a member of the Luton Conservative & Unionist Club & is the secretary & cashier at a straw & felt hat manufactures, his brother William James, 18 is also working at the same place as a clerk & junior warehouseman. His mother Margaret is looking after their 9 roomed home with help from a live-in servant, 19 year old Fanny Clark.

In August 1914 Herbert joined the RAMC alongside his brother William. Soon after enlistment Herbert was transferred to the 4th London Field Ambulance Service.

Whilst on service in Watford in January 1915 Herbert had spent 3 weeks frequently wet through & unable to change into clean dry clothes, as a result he caught a severe cold which developed into influenza. He spent 18 days in a London hospital in May 1915 with pleurisy. He was discharged as medically unfit with Tubercle of the lung on 29th May 1915.

Herbert survived the war but died on 8th January 1920. He is buried in the general cemetery on Rothesay Road.