Selwyn Pike

Bank: National Provincial Bank of England

Place of work: Newport, Monmouth branch

Died: 18 July 1918

Selwyn Harry Pike was born on 18 January 1892, the son of Charles Pike, a merchant, and his wife Annie. Charles died while Selwyn was still a child, and Annie remarried, to George Edmonds.

In June 1909, when Pike was 17 years old, he went to work for National Provincial Bank of England as an apprentice at its Brighton branch. He completed his apprenticeship three years later, and in September 1912 moved to Newport, Monmouth branch as a clerk.

During the First World War Pike left his job at the bank to join the army, as a Lance Corporal in the North Somerset Yeomanry, posted to the 6th (Inniskilling) Dragoons. He was taken prisoner in April 1918, and died of inflammation of the lungs in a German prisoner of war camp on 18 July 1918. He was 26 years old, and left a widow, Sybil, whom he had married in 1916.