Eric Scott Aplin was born on 18 November 1895, in Upnoor, Kent, the son of Lt Col and Mrs H M Aplin (née Scott), of Clinton Lodge, Budleigh Salterton, South Devon. He attended Mount House in Plymouth and then, with a scholarship, King’s School, Rochester. After school he passed into Sandhurst.

After Sandhurst, Aplin joined the 2nd Worcester Regiment in 1914 and after three days went to France, aged 18, with the British Expeditionary Force. Quickly in action, he soon found himself in command of two companies as so many officers were killed or wounded in the early skirmishes. As a result, he was promoted to Captain after only one year in the army. He experienced the retreat of the British forces from the River Aisne in Northern France before being invalided home owing to a fever he had caught from time spent in water-filled trenches.

Aplin spent the winter of 1914 in England and visited Mount House in Plymouth during his convalescence. He returned to France in the Spring of 1915 and was shot in the thigh on 26 September 1915 during battle at Loos which left him lame. At the same time, a bullet hit him in the chest, but he was saved by the contents of his jacket pocket – although he was disappointed to find that the bullet had destroyed his cheque book! His injury forced him to seek cover in a shell hole where he waited to be rescued. He was wounded again during the battle of the Somme in November 1916.

Eric Scott Aplin died of wounds received at the battle of Passchendaale on 11 March 1918 aged 22. He is buried in the Nine Elms British Cemetery near the town of Poperinge, Belgium.