Leonard James William's Story.
Birkenhead News 17 April 1918
POSTMAN KILLED BY A SNIPER.
News has been received by his brother at 9, St. Paul’s Road, Rock Ferry, that Leonard J. W. Johnson, of the Machine Gun Corps, was killed in action on April 5th. During an attack Pte. Johnson was endeavouring to mount his gun upon the parapet, and was shot through the head by a sniper. His officer in a letter says he had always found him to be a keen, clean, sober and steady man, a man who knew no fear. He was educated at St. Anne’s School, Rock Ferry, and would have been 20 years of age on the 22nd of this month. Before the war he was employed as a postman at the G.P.O., was well-known throughout the town, and highly respected by everybody he came into contact with. He joined H.M. Forces in December, 1916, and was sent to France in April, 1917. He was home on leave only last February, and was in the best of spirits.