Pte Christopher Shenton

Private Christopher Shenton of 1st Battalion, The Staffordshire Regiment died on 20th January 1981.

Service Number: 24497200

He died aged 21, after being shot by a sniper at Castle Gate, City Walls, Londonderry, while on foot patrol.

They were closing security gates on the city walls at Castle Gate in Londonderry when the  attack occurred, at around 7:30PM. A number of high velocity shots had been fired from the Waterloo Street area. The bullet that killed Pte Shenton passed through the security gate. He was shot in the back and another soldier was wounded. CHristopher died instantly.

After training at Whittington Barracks (where he won the Medal for best S.L R shot of his platoon), Christopher joined the 1st Battalion at Colchester in February 1977, and immediately went with the Battalion to exercise in Kenya. He subsequently trained at Lydd, Hythe and Stanford, and moved to Londonderry with his company in August 1979. 

At the military funeral at Dresden, near Longdon, Stone-on-Trent, on Wednesday 28th January, there were in congregation (which overflowed the church) a large number of his fellow soldiers, who had arrived on leave the evening before. The funeral was also attended by the Colonel of the regiment, the Commanding officer, of 1st Battalion and numerous civic representatives, as well as the association and wider regimental family. 

He was born on 20th March 1959 and his nickname was Sharky.