Have managed to research Francis Spence and Ann Fenton. He is the man pictured above, was originally married to Lily but then married Ann, fought and survived WW1 and he and Ann went on to have at least three children. He died in 1955.
So, our Vincent Battista served as Frank V Spence in the Middlesex Regiment and died in Flanders 1 August 1917. He is buried in a war cemetery there (see picture).
The reason he assumed an alias is still unknown but it now seems it was quite a common thing to do.. hopefully the project I mentioned above will shed some light on why.
The only anomaly's that remain are:
1) Francis Age - he was born in 1876 but on marrying Lily he noted his age as 25 not 29 and on marrying Ann he is 28 not 34! Most likely this was because the women were much younger than him. Lily was 21 and Ann 25.
2) The Tynemouth Memorial to Vincent Battista states his death as 24 Sep 1916. It seems it is not unusual for someone to have used an alias but to have their actual names recorded on their gravestones/memorials. However I cannot find any reference or connection to this date. I did find out that the details for the Tynemouth Memorial were complied by asking people to check a list and add their loved ones names to the list via the Shields Daily News. I guess there would be lots of opportunity for human error and maybe Vincent's name got mixed up with someone else's details. There is no Francis Spence on the memorial list, obviously because he didn't die. I think perhaps Vincent's date of 1 Aug 1917 just got put against the wrong name
.
3) Finally, I still cant think why Vincent's sisters didn't print any memorial to him in the paper as they had done for John George. I suppose someone must have added his name to the Tynemouth list via the newspaper request, as he isn't printed in the paper. I am hopeful it's just that the newspaper may not have been digitised. May be one day I will find something. Seems a shame as they were clearly happy to accept his pay and medals.
