JOHN JAMES DARLINGTON 

Regimental Number 3589 Sapper John Joseph Darlington, 45th (Fortress) Company, Royal Engineers, accidentally shot dead at Bloemfontein, on May 11, 1901. He was 23 years old. He is buried in President Brand Cemetery, President Avenue, Bloemfontein, South Africa. 

Remembered in the Municipal Building, Crewe
John is commemorated on a plaque on the ground floor of the Municipal Building, Earle Street, Crewe, along with six local men from the Royal Engineers who did not return to Crewe from the Boer War, Sappers Ankers, Coops, Evans, Foy, Madeley, Roberts, Robinson and Talbot, and Lieutenant Charles Trotter from Polesworth in Warwickshire.

John Joseph Darlington was born in the summer of 1878, at Preston Brockhurst, near Whitchurch in Shropshire. He was the third son of Thomas Darlington (b.1849) and Eleanor Buckley (b.1850). He grew up in the village of Ash Parva, Ash, Whitchurch, Shropshire, with his two elder brothers William Buckley Darlington (1873–1945) and Thomas Edward, and his younger brothers Richard (1881–1953) and Robert (1884–1955).

By the age of 12, John was working as a farm servant for the Nield family in Ash Parva. On 28th August 1899, when he was 21, he joined the 2nd Cheshire Railway Engineers. He was then working for the London & North Western Railway.

He departed for South Africa with the second draft of Railway Reserves (member of “A” Company) in April 1901. Just a few weeks later, on May 11th 1901, John was accidentally shot and killed in Bloemfontein. He was 23 years old.

He is buried in President Brand Cemetery, President Avenue, Bloemfontein, South Africa. (His gravestone wrongly records his date of death as May 18th) 



He was entitled to the Cape Colony and Orange Free State clasps.  As he was unmarried, his father Thomas was his next of kin. One additional clasp was sent to his father on 19 May 1903.

John is commemorated on the Royal Engineers South African Memorial Arch in Brompton Barracks, Gillingham, Kent as well as in Crewe.

CREWE ENGINEER SHOT. Information reached Crewe on Friday to the effect that Sapper John Darlington, a Crewe railway engineer, who left Crewe Works with a party of engineers for South Africa early this year, had been shot at Bloemfontein. The deceased was a young man, and attached to the A Company of the 2nd Cheshire Railway Engineers.

CASUALTIES

3589 Darlington, accidentally killed, Bloemfontein, May 11.