The Culley family had moved to Filey when Reg and his brother Tom were young from Bath, and after leaving school the brothers stayed and got jobs in Filey until they enlisted at the declaration of war in August 1914.

Reg joined the 8^th Battalion, London Regt. (Royal Fusiliers) and went to France in late 1915, where he stayed at the front line for several months with this unit, but eventually died of wounds at Bethune Military Hospital.  Word reached is mother Annie Culley a fortnight later at 1 Hope Street, but this was not the only piece of bad news to befall the Culley family in 1916.