MANY Bradford families had one or two sons, sometimes more, in the First World War. The Knowles family, for example, had two: Jonathan Edward Knowles and his younger brother Eric Walter Knowles.

Their father, Edward Sugden Knowles, a wealthy Bradford worsted merchant, emigrated to Australia where he met his wife Frances. After Edward died his widow moved to Rawdon.

Jonathan, who attended Sedbergh School and then Bradford Grammar School, served with the 4th Middlesex Regiment and was killed at the Battle of Mons in Belgium on August 23, 1914, covering the retreat of the main British Expeditionary Force.

The British took 1,600 casualties that day, a quarter of which were Middlesex Regiment men. Jonathan Knowles, 32, a veteran of the Boer war, was thought to be the first BEF officer to be killed. He is buried in Cement House Cemetery, Langemark, near Ypres in Belgium.

He is commemorated on two memorials in Rawdon Parish Church and on the Greengates war memorial.

His brother Eric, who survived the war, was a Territorial with the 1/6th Battalion of the West Yorkshire Regiment. He was wounded during a series of bloody engagements at Thiepval Wood, on the Somme, in July, 1916.

Eric's role on that first day of the Somme is a matter of friendly dispute between two First World War historians, David Whithorn, of the Great War Society, and Tricia Platts, secretary of the Bradford World War 1 Group.

David says Eric Knowles is Bradford's unrecognised war hero who countermanded an official order to attack and saved 400 men from being killed or wounded. Tricia said there is no evidence that he did anything which could be construed as irregular or worthy of criticism from senior officers.

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David said: "Bradford will commemorate the sacrifice of its two Pals battalions on the centenary of the Somme on July 1, 2016. A tragedy here is that Bradford’s Territorial battalions may be missed.

"The 1/6th West Yorks played their part on that day at Thiepval. In another hopeless attack they too suffered grievous casualties, all Bradford men – but fewer, and maybe a reason why they are barely remembered today.

"This was due to the courageous decision of a Bradford officer countermanding a direct order to attack. He saved 400 Bradford soldiers' lives that day; he was not thanked by those in authority. He would be seriously wounded days later, nearly losing his life.

"His actions and that of his battalion would go almost unrecorded in the regimental history. His family would not know, but countless people alive in Bradford today whose relatives served in the 1/6th West Yorks on the Somme, unknowingly owe their very lives to him – Captain. Eric Walter ‘Billy’ Knowles.

"In 1981, with limited knowledge of the Great War, I met Harry Smith of Bingley. Then at 90, Harry was one of Bradford’s oldest Great War veterans.

"Harry told me that he, along with the 1/6th West Yorkshires, had spent the morning of July 1, 1916 in Thiepval Wood, waiting for the order to ‘push through to Bapaume’.

"In front were the 36th and 32nd Divisions. The latter had been annihilated at 7.30am that morning; their dead littered the ridge before Thiepval village. The 36th had fared better and had captured several key German positions, but they now risked being cut off.

"Hours were to pass with no orders, the streams of wounded came back into the wood, the place became a charnel house – the sights and sounds Harry was re-living before me, but he went on:-

"‘In the afternoon we finally received orders to move forward and stage an attack. Not to support the Irishmen of the 36th, but directly towards the village of Thiepval itself. There had been no movement here for hours, the Germans were up there looking down into the wood where we were, the dead lay in hundreds.

"'We were formed up into two waves of two companies; I was to be in the second wave. Our covering barrage seemed to last only a matter of minutes whistles blew and the first two companies went over, up the hill.

"'The machine guns opened up, many never got over the parapet. Their attack lasted just minutes; they never even got halfway up the hill. Our wounded came back. Then there came a silence, we were the next to go, we knew what the result would be.

"‘Then a message came down the trench ‘it’s off, the officer has called it off’. I owe my life, and that of my family, to this man who stopped that suicidal attack – and now, I cannot remember his name.’ "

Further researches led David to discover the officer's identity and to take a greater interest in the West Yorkshire Territorials.

Going back to that Saturday of July 1, 1916, Tricia Platts says the 1/6th Battalion was divided into four companies. 'A' Company was held in reserve. 'B' Company's job was to support 'C' and 'D' Companies which were ordered to attack, as Harry Smith says, in two waves.

The attack started at 4pm and both officers leading 'C' and 'D' Companies were soon wounded, leaving Captain Eric Knowles in the midst of battle to weigh up whether to continue and risk more casualties or to call a halt. Evidently he decided against calling up the men of 'A' and 'B' Companies - presumably the 400 men David refers to.

Tricia said: "He was a very experienced, older man with sufficient good sense to 'read' the battle - and the confidence to make a timely decision.

"This is the whole point of 'officer-ship' on the battlefield: to do the job by being decisive and looking after the men. His decision does not equate to 'countermanding an order' as the attack had already been carried out.

"Some days later the Battalion was 'warmly congratulated' by Corps and Divisional generals (the absolute top brass) on the speed with which an almost impossible order from Brigade level had been carried out.

"The 6th Battalion was the only one in the Brigade which succeeded in mounting an attack within the time span. The work of the 6th Battalion that day saved many men of the Ulster Division (the 36th) by drawing enemy fire away from many Ulster men stranded on another part of the battlefield.

"On July 2, the Bradford men were still in trenches under constant bombardment and with artillery from both sides adding to the cacophony overhead which continued until about 9pm.

"At lunchtime the men were given their first rough meal since leaving base on June 30. An enemy counter-attack was expected but didn't materialise; it's quite likely that the enemy were anticipating exactly the same."

The two Knowles brothers, each in their own way at a different stage in the war, played a part in saving the lives of others. Jonathan was killed, Eric was seriously wounded by shellfire on July 24, 1916.