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24/08/1890 - 28/09/1915

Place of birth: Sydenham, London
Last known address in Bromley: Rothesay 96 Plaistow Lane

Military information

Regiment/Service: Royal Army Medical Corps
Battalion/Ship: 85th Bn (1st/3rd London) Field Amb
Rank: Private
Number: 345

Family information

Parents: Thomas Edward & Lizzie Davis Goodyear (nee Keddell)
Parents' occupation: Chartered accountant
Siblings: Kathleen Mary
Wife: Nancy Winifred Martin
Marriage date: 08-01-1915
Children: None

Census information

1891
Address: Denby, Trewsbury Road, Lewisham
1901
Address: 9 Rodway Road
1911
Address: Lyn Valley Hotel, Lynmouth
Occupation: Student

Extra details

Kenneth was the eldest of Thomas and Lizzie Goodyear's two children. Kenneth attended Holmby House School, Bromley from 1898 to 1902, then King's School, Grantham, Lincolnshire, from 1902 to 1906, and finally Brighton College from 1906 to 1909.

He matriculated at Magdalen College, Oxford as a Demy in Mathematics on 13 October 1909, but after failing Responsions in Trinity Term 1909, he had to re-sit them in Michaelmas Term 1909. He took the First Public Examinations in October 1910 and was awarded a 1st in Mathematical Moderations in Trinity Term 1910. He then changed to Law and was awarded a 1st in Jurisprudence in Trinity Term 1912. He gained his BA, with first class honours, on 6 July 1912 and in 1913 he was offered a special Exhibition for being the most distinguished Demy of his year. On graduation he joined a firm of chartered accountants, and in July 1914 he achieved the fifth best result in the Intermediate Examination of the Institute of Chartered Accountants.

Kenneth came from a religious family and was a very close friend of the pacifist and conscientious objector Albert Victor Murray. Although Kenneth was probably a pacifist, he joined the Army as a stretcher bearer and became a Private in ‘C' Section of the 85th (1/3rd London) Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps, a unit that was set up at Horsley, Winchester, Hampshire, on 1 January 1915 and equipped with seven motor ambulances. Just one week after his marriage to Nancy Martin he travelled to Southampton on 16 January, disembarked at Le Havre on 18 January, and arrived at Hazebrouck, in northern France just south of the frontier with Belgium, on 20 January. From there he was in the fighting in the Ypres area as part of 84th Brigade, 28th Division. On the 24/25 September the 29th Field Ambulance Unit moved from Bethune to "very strong and large dugouts at Sailly la Bourse [two miles WNW of Vermelles and about five miles from the front line], made for the unit by the 9th Seaforth Pioneer Battalion" in preparation for the Battle of Loos, which began at 06.30 on the morning of 25 September. A more advanced station was set up on the Vermelles-Cambrin Road. The first casualties were brought in shortly after the attack began: "gas cases from our own gas owing to change of direction of the wind". By the time 29th Field Ambulance was relieved at 16.00 on 28 September by the 85th Field Ambulance, the unit had dealt with over 2,000 casualties. It was while collecting the injured from near the captured German trenches that Kenneth was killed by a shell.

Kenneth is also commemorated on a stained glass window in the Chapel of Brighton College: the left light depicts St Joseph, the centre light depicts St Peter and a Pelican (a common medieval image of Christ), and the right light depicts St John; the inscription reads "To the Glory of God and in loving memory of Kenneth Charles Goodyear / killed at Vermelles September 28th 1915 while serving in the R.A.M.C. / Whosoever will be chief among you let him be your servant. Matt 20-27". He was not commemorated on the War Memorial at King's School, Grantham, until 2014.

Thank you to the Brighton College archivist and "The Slow Dusk Project" Magdalen College, Oxford for their assistance.