Francis Matt Lawledge, born in 1881, was admitted to King Edward’s School in 1893, staying for only a year. His father, Edward, was a manufacturer, and the family lived at 2, Duchess Road, Edgbaston.
In his brief year at the School, Francis was middling academically, but made his mark by winning the gymnastics competition, going “through his exercises in capital form.” After School, he emigrated to Canada, and married Anne, settling in Manitoba where he worked as an engineer in charge of location survey for the Hudson’s Bay Railway.
Francis travelled back to Britain on the outbreak of war to join up, enlisting as a Private Soldier in the 17th Royal Fusiliers in 1915. In February 1916, he was gazetted as a Second Lieutenant in the Royal Engineers, and was then attached to the Royal Flying Corps, 70th Squadron. Francis was killed whilst flying near Arras on 10th October 1916, aged thirty-eight. He is buried in Bailleul Road East Cemetery, France, and he left his estate of £138 to his wife.