Lieutenant, East Yorkshire Regiment
Born: May 11th 1892
Died: September 26th 1915
Age at Death: 23
Killed in action, France, September 26th 1915.
Son of Bernard Cubitt of North Walsham, Norfolk. Bryan took up farming in Norfolk following his time at the College.
A donation to the memorial statue has been made in honour of this soldier by the Tiplady Family.
2nd Lieutenant Bryan Barton Cubitt
Bryan Barton Cubitt was born in 1892 to Bernard and Helen Cubitt. He had a younger sister Helen, born in 1897. The household was completed by a live-in housemaid and cook. They lived at Park Farm, Witton in Norfolk. Bernard Cubitt came from a long line of gentlemen farmers who had lived and farmed the same area of land in Norfolk. Helen Cubitt’s family by contrast came from Goudhurst, Kent and it is perhaps because of that Bryan was educated at Brighton College (Chichester House) from 1906 to 1910. School records indicate that he was a skilled and passionate Cricket player who not only played for the school but also for Norfolk County Cricket Club.
After leaving school he joined his father on the farm and is listed in the 1911 Census as a poultry farmer and ‘employer’. It is clear that the farm was involved in more than just poultry, indeed it was probably predominantly arable so it may be that Bryan Cubitt had started a nascent poultry business, which was a relatively new aspect of farming at the time.
On the outbreak of war Bryan Cubitt received a commission in the 8th battalion East Yorkshire Regiment formed as one of Kitchener’s ‘New Batallions’ on 22 September 1914. After a fairly prolonged period of training, during which it appears that Cubitt was promoted to Lieutenant, the battalion landed at Boulogne on 9th September 1915. It fought its first battle in the failed offensive at Loos, which commenced on the 25th September 1915 and claimed the lives of a significant proportion of the Old Brightonians killed in the war. On the following day Bryan Cubitt lost his life, there is no record of his grave or the actual circumstances of his death but he is commemorated on the Loos memorial.
Source: LEST WE FORGET PROJECT, Brighton College 2014/15