MILDENHALL TRAGEDY
by A.M. Cobern

In the bank beside the Marlborough to Ramsbury road and opposite the old Mildenhall Rectory is a small stone cross erected in memory of my grandmothers cousin, Alfred Henry Pounds Watts - Harry to his friends - who was fatally injured while trying to stop a team of runaway horses.
Harry who was fourteen years old at the time of his death, lived at Axford and worked as a ploughboy for Mr. Stephen Butler, a Stitchcombe farmer. On the morning of Monday, May 12th, 1879, he and Mr. Henry Pett, a carter on the farm, took some sacks of wheat on a wagon drawn by three horses to Marlborough railway station. After making their delivery they returned to Stitchcombe with the empty wagon for another twenty five sacks with which they left at about 12.30pm. But this time after the wheat had been unloaded they loaded the wagon with two tons of coal, finally leaving the station for home at approximately quarter to four accompanied by another of Mr. Butler's wagons that was also loaded with coal. When they reached the Bear & Castle (now the Bear Hotel) at the eastern end of Marlborough High Street they stopped to share a quart of ale given to them by Mr. Steele, the man from whom they had got the coal, with the two men from the wagon, and at the Queen's Head they halted for ten minutes and the four of them shared a quart of beer. They then set off on the final lap of their journey with Harry's and Mr. Pett's wagon in the lead, Harry walking beside the first horse and Mr. Pett beside the third.
They had travelled nearly a mile and come to the top of the slope by Mildenhall Rectory when the horses on the leading wagon bolted. Mr. Pett tried to grab the one nearest to him but was knocked down by a blow from the shaft, unhurt, he scrambled to his feet and rushed to help Harry, who, a few yards further on, was struggling desperately to hold the rearing animals, they were too strong for him however, and aghast with horror Mr. Pett saw him slip and fall beneath the wagon, one of the rear wheels passing over his body as Mr. Pett caught up with it. Free now from all restraint the horses galloped down the slope only to come to grief at the bottom when the leader tried to turn left and the others, wishing to go straight on, blundered into it and all three fell in a heap surrounded by coal and the wreckage of the overturned wagon. Two riders were approaching from Mildenhall as they fell, one said later that only an unexpected delay had prevented him from being involved in the accident, the other, a Mr. Musselwhite of Marlborough recognized the wagon as one belonging to Mr. Butler and rode off at once to fetch him.
A Mrs. Brown of Mildenhall was driving along in her carriage just behind the Wagons and when she saw Harry's body lying in the road she turned straight round and went back to Marlborough for a doctor. Harry was still alive though mercifully unconscious and Mr. Pett picked him up and carried him to Mildenhall and into the first house he came to. Harry never regained consciousness and died at five past seven in the doctor's presence, his body was then taken to his home.