Victor Horace Peasey was born on 14th May 1893 in Melton and was baptised in St Andrew’s Church on the 23rd July that year. In 1911, Victor was working as a domestic gardener.

Victor enlisted on the 14th August 1914 and joined the 3rd Battalion, Suffolk Regiment, at their war base in Felixstowe for training. On 1st April 1915, he was posted to France, along with a draft of four hundred and fifteen other men, joining the 1st Battalion, Suffolk Regiment, who were in billets near Dranoutre on the 8th. On 15th April, the battalion marched to Vlamertinghe in Belgium. Two days later, they moved on to Zonnebeke.

The 1st Suffolks were in trenches at Frezenberg when, on the morning of 24th April, they were involved in the opening stages of the Battle of St Julien. It was here they encountered their first gas attack from the German Army. On 26th April, just eighteen days after joining the battalion, Victor was on his way home after being shot in his right shoulder.

In August 1915, once recovered from his wounds, Victor was sent back to the front line, posted to join the 7th Battalion, Suffolk Regiment. On the 12th October 1916, he was once again on the front line. The History of the Suffolk Regiment described their time in the trenches:

“On October 11th the battalion having been allotted its task in the Battle of Transloy received orders to take part in an attack on Bayonet trench and Luisenhof farm, which had been fixed for the 12th. Going in overnight they were heavily shelled until they had occupied their assembly trenches just before dawn. After passing a reasonably quiet forenoon the battalion set out across the open at 2:00pm, coming immediately under very heavy cross fire of every description, but mainly from machine guns and automatic rifles.”

 Victor’s battalion sustained over five hundred casualties that afternoon with over one hundred men killed. Victor was posted as “missing” and it wasn’t until a year later that his family received the news that he had been killed on, or around, 12th October 1916.

The Woodbridge Reporter and Wickham Market Gazette reported on 17th September 1917:

The Toll of War – Lance Corporal Victor Peasey

Mr and Mrs E Peasey of 82 Cumberland Street Woodbridge, have received official notification that their second son Lance Corporal Victor Peasey of the Suffolk Regiment, who was posted “missing” since 12th October 1916 has now been recorded as killed on or about that date. Lance Corporal Victor Peasey, who was 23 years of age on May 14th 1916, enlisted very soon after the outbreak of war on August 14th 1914. He went out to France and was wounded in March 1915. On recovery he went out again in August the same year. Mr and Mrs Peasey have had four sons engaged in the war. One served in the Dardanelles, was invalided home and afterwards discharged; another was wounded in France, and lost his right eye. He has also received his discharge in consequence. The other son is still with the fighting forces in France.

Victor was buried in a small, battlefield cemetery close to where he had been killed. In 1919, his body was recovered and taken for burial in Beaulencourt British Cemetery, Ligny-Thilloy. For his war service, Victor’s family received the 1914-15 Star and the British War and Victory Medals.