Sgt Arthur Woodcroft, who was on board the troopship Royal Edward when it was torpedoed and sunk in the Aegean Sea [August 13th, 1915] is reported as being among those saved, but we regret to learn that there is another Lutonian who joined the RAMC with him, and also sailed on the same boat, Pte EWART WILLIAM CLARK, son of Daniel and Emma Jane Clark, of 7 Park Road West, who has not been heard of up to the present.

The parents have written to the War Office inquiring for news, and on Saturday a reply was received stating that the list of survivors from the attack on the Royal Edward has now been received, and it is regretted that the name of No. 82, Pte E. W. Clark, RAMC, 54th East Anglian Casualty Clearing Station, does not appear upon it. The list of missing, says the letter from the War Office, is expected shortly, and until it is received it cannot be definitely stated whether Pte Clark was on board.

On Friday, Mr and Mrs Clark received a letter from their 17-year-old son which bore the date August 9th on the postmark, five days before the transport went down. In this letter Pte Clark wrote: "Am in the best of health and enjoying myself, and I shall never forget this as long as I live. All I am waiting for is the time to come when the mail comes from Luton as I am looking forward to a letter from home.

"I am orderly in the hospital on board for four days, but there are only two or three cases - not as many as we shall see in a few weeks time. The food on board is fairly good, and we have to sleep in hammocks, so I am getting quite a sailor. The sea is quite calm, and the ship sails along very smoothly without rocking a great lot.

"The last two Sundays the two parsons in our Corps have conducted a church parade, and we have had some very nice services, but do not expect to have more than another one on board this ship."

Pte Ewart William Clark (pictured, right) was the second son of Mr and Mrs Clark, of 7 Park Road West, and his elder brother, Seaman C. Clark, was serving on HMS Bonaventure. As a boy he attended the Slip End, Hitchin Road and Surrey Street Schools, and early showed a love for ambulance work. While yet a lad he was one of four who won a shield for ambulance work, offered at the Wellington Street Baptist Sunday School and, on the formation of the Luton Corps of the St John Ambulance Association, he displayed a keen interest in the work of this organisation.

Like Sgt Woodcroft, he volunteered for service as a hospital orderly under the British Red Cross Society on the outbreak of war, and they were the only two members picked out from among the Luton Men's V.A.D. for service with the RAMC at the East Anglian Clearing Station. The two joined together in February, and Pte Clark became a second-class orderly in his unit. Prior to enlisting Pte Clark was in the employ of the Co-operative Society.

Sgt ARTHUR WOODCROFT, East Anglian Casualty Clearing Station, R.A.M.C., whose home is at 73 Ivy Road, Luton, and who was on the torpedoed and sunk troopship the Royal Edward, has written to his mother to say that he is safe.

In a first letter all Sgt Woodcroft says about the sinking is, "We had a bit of an accident," and asks that his friends are told that he is all right.

Yesterday [September 1st] , Mrs Woodcroft received another letter. In this he said that when the transport sank he received a nasty gash on the head, but it was now getting well He lost all his personal property, including his watch, and in asking his mother to send out certain things to him, he says: "We don't get much money here, and if we did we couldn't spend it."

Sgt Woodcroft (pictured below, left) was employed by hat manufacturers Messrs A. Hucklesby and Co, of 46 George Street, Luton, before enlisting. He lost a brother in the fighting around Ypres last November, and his father is on the staff of the Bedfordshires at Kempston Barracks.

Sgt Woodcroft was reluctant to disclose his experiences of the sinking, but more light was thrown on the incident in a letter to Mrs Woodcroft from Mrs Green in West Kirby, Cheshire. Sgt Woodcroft had asked his mother to write to Mrs Green to say that her husband, Lieut Green, was also safe.

In her letter, printed in the Saturday Telegraph, Mrs Green wrote: "I have heard from my husband, who is now at Malta. Your son was with him in the water after the Royal Edward was torpedoed. They had an old boat to cling to.

"I am afraid they were in the water four and a half hours before they were picked up. My husband told me that all the men who were with him were picked up quite safe, and all well, except that their nerves were a bit shaken at first. Otherwise quite well in health, and being well looked after and given a good rest. So don't you worry.

"Your son is not ill or in hospital, but probably having a good time with the other young men at the headquarters island.

"Life belts were served out to everyone on the Royal Edward, so that being unable to swim would make no difference to your son. My husband has quite got over it, and writes me cheery, jolly letters - and he is not a young man, and all that time in the water has not affected him. The climate there is hot, so the water would be warm."

The theory we [The Luton Reporter] suggested that Pte WALTER CYRIL ALLEN, of 15 Rothesay Road, Luton, who accompanied Lieut Kiddle when he was promoted from his position of Quarter-Master of the 1/5th Battalion of the Bedfordshire Regiment to be Divisional Quarter-Master, and sailed with him on the Royal Edward, was not on the transport at the time it was sunk, has now been confirmed by a letter which Mrs Allen received from her husband on Saturday morning.

Pte Allen (pictured above, right), it will be remembered, cabled from Alexandria two days after the ship was sunk to say that he was safe, and in his letter, which is dated the next day, he explains that the reason he sent the cablegram was, as we anticipated, that he expected his wife to see in due course the news that the Royal Edward had been torpedoed and sunk.

"She had only left Alexandria harbour about two hours before she was hit," he writes, "and about 800 lives were lost. We of the base depot landed at Alexandria. We have quite a number of rescued here, and they have only what they stand up in. It was only merciful Providence that we did not have to go on, but tomorrow we have to start, and got three days further on."

[Luton Reporter: Monday, August 30th, 1915. The Luton News, September 2nd, 1915, and Beds & Herts Saturday Telegraph, September 4th, 1915]