(64) Claude Leonard Toye, Lance Corporal, SD/3034 13th Bn Royal Sussex Regiment
 

64th of the Old Boys of St Wilfrid's School, Haywards Heath to lose his life in the Great War.

Born on 18th October 1888 in Haywards Heath and living in Franklynn Road in 1891, Claude was the youngest of the 8 children of Alfred and Rosamund Toye. Alfred worked at St Francis Hospital, which was then known as the County Asylum. By 1901 the family had moved to Sydney Road, but by 1911 Claude was living with his older brother Clement in Hailsham and working in Clement’s china and hardware business.

Claude married Clara Maud Ellis, a grocer’s daughter, in 1915; he was killed in action 30 June 1916 in France, aged 27 and is buried at Cabaret-Rouge British Cemetery, Souchez grave XV N 29. On 26th July 1916 Clara had appealed in the Sussex Agricultural Express for any news about him to be sent to her via the New England Road Post Office, Haywards Heath, as at that stage it was only known that he had been missing from the 1st July and it took a while for official news of his death. Later, in 1921, she married policeman George Moody; she died in Haywards Heath in 1956.

Clara had been sent his effects of 7d on 18th July 1917, this was followed on 1st September 1919 by a War Gratuity of £6.