Geoffrey Cushion

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Jeffrey Cushion was born in 1879 in Tasburgh where his parents, James the local roadman and Mary lived at the far end of Marl Bottom or Marl Pit Lane with Jeffry's 8 younger siblings. At the outbreak of WW1 Jeffrey was working as a farm labourer and living with his wife Annie and their five children in a two bedroomed cottage being part of a row which stood at the old junction of Church Road and the A140, approximately where the village sign now stands. The cottages were demolished following a fire in the 1930s.

It seems that he joined up in 1914 as part of one of the three volunteer battalions of the Norfolk Regiment, the same Regiment as his cousin Herbert Cushion, but he was then later transferred to the 1st Battalion of the Essex Regiment. It is known that in 1915 100 men were transferred from the Norfolks to replace losses suffered by the 1st Essex at Gallipoli. On the first day of the Battle of the Somme the 1st Battalion of the Essex Regiment were to advance with the Canadian 1st Newfoundland Battalion as a follow up to the initial attack on the German strongpoint at Beaumont Hamel, but such was the number of casualties from that initial attack the Essex were delayed and the 800 Newfoundlanders who advanced on their own were wiped out with over 700 dead or wounded, including every single officer who went forward . When the 1st Essex did advance their losses were over 200 men but it isn't known whether Jeffrey Cushion was one of those wounded or whether he was wounded in the following few days before his Battalion was relieved.

A Divisional casualty clearing station at Acheux behind the lines had been established before the battle where Jeffrey died of his wounds on 11th July and was buried in the associated British Cemetery there. The only slight mystery is why his name is misspelled as Geoffrey on Tasburgh's Memorial but his is not the only one that's incorrect.