Private Alfred McCracken was deployed to the Western Front on 23rd August 1914 with ‘C’ Squadron 4th (Queen’s Own) Hussars and Died of Wounds at 13th General Hospital on 14th May 1915 and is buried in the Boulogne Eastern Cemetery in France.
He was injured during the Second Battle of Ypres which was fought from 22 April to 25 May 1915 for control of the tactically important high ground to the east and south of the Flemish town of Ypres in western Belgium.
The First Battle of Ypres had been fought the previous autumn. The Second Battle of Ypres was the first mass use by Germany of poison gas on the Western Front.
He was a son of Robert McCracken and Sarah McCracken (nee Boyd) of Vere Street, Belfast
Alfred McCracken died on his 20th birthday.
A newspaper clipping records that he was employed at the shipyard prior to enlisting but he must have already been in the army at the start of the war in order to have been deployed with the 4th Hussars in August 1914.
As he was not employed by Workman Clark at the start of the war, his name is not recorded on the Workman Clark Shipyard Memorial.
