Lance Corporal William Arnold Braid
Interred in Authuile Military Cemetery, Somme, France. Name commemorated on the Diamond War Memorial.
Brother of Mr George Braid, 14, Bellevue Avenue, Londonderry, who appears to have signed the Ulster Covenant (September 1912), pledging resistance to Home Rule for Ireland, and was possibly the husband of Elizabeth Hanna (died May 4, 1942).
Corporal William Arnold Braid was a member of First Derry Presbyterian Church.
He was a married man, and left a wife and only child. He was about twenty-nine years of age, and assisted his brother in the window cleaning business.
A comrade writing home said a high explosive shell killed him. In a letter to the deceased's widow an officer of the battalion said ? Dear Madam ? It is with a sad heart that I write to you about the death of your husband, Lance Corporal Braid. He was the cheeriest soul in the company, and always ready for any work or play. His end was, I am glad to say, sudden, and death was instantaneous, so that he cannot have had any pain. In fact, he cannot have known anything about it. He was most popular in the company, and we will miss his cheery jokes and songs with which he helped the men on our long marches. He was the first man in our company to lay down his life for the great cause, and I feel his death more than I can tell you.
The name of William Braid was read out at a memorial service held, in St Columb's (Church of Ireland) Cathedral, Londonderry, on Sunday, July 30, 1916, to pay homage to the memory of the men of the city of Derry, who died during the second year of the Great War. His name was again read aloud during a special memorial service held in First Derry Presbyterian Church, on Friday, August 4, 1916, to pay tribute to the Presbyterian soldiers of the city of Londonderry, who had died during the first two years of the Great War. William Braid's name was yet again read out during a memorial service in First Derry Presbyterian Church held, on Sunday, July 1, 1917, to commemorate the members of that congregation who, up to that time, had made the supreme sacrifice in the First World War.