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Word has been received at the University office that Clyde Fairbanks Maxwell '14, was reported missing on July 3, 1916, in the first engagements of the battle of the Somme. He was a second lieutenant in the Tenth Battalion of the Essex Regiment, British Army.
According to the officers of his regiment the attack started at 3 o'clock in the morning. Maxwell's captain reported that at four o'clock he was seen "wounded in the face but still organizing bombing attacks and handing over prisoners"; and an hour later, as reported by his sergeant, he was "very hard pressed but still fighting on." The ground was bitterly contested and the dead were buried hastily at night, without the usual opportunity to search them for identification. The battalion entered the battle eleven hundred strong, of whom only 98 answered roll call that night. Maxwell was not of this number, and his name was set down under "missing" in the official casualty lists. Of Maxwell's company only twenty men survived and of his own platoon not one. The chance that he still lives, a prisoner in Germany, is said to be very slight, as none of the battalion were made prisoners.
Clyde Fairbanks Maxwell was born at Northampton, Mass., on April 14, 1892. He prepared for college at the Armidale School, New South Wales, Australia, and entered with the Class of 1914. While at Harvard he rowed on various dormitory and club crews, as well as being on the University soccer squad. For two year, 1911-13, he won Harvard College Scholarships. He was one of the editors of the Illustrated Magazine.
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