Saturday 27th October 1917

Zudausques

Training and range practice.

Pte. Walter Smith (18428) (see 18^th October) was promoted Corporal.

Pte. Robert Hitchen (see 13^th November 1916) was appointed (unpaid) Lance Corporal.

Sgt. Edward Robert Butler (see 5^th September) was admitted to 1^st Australian General Hospital at Rouen, suffering from myalgia; in the absence of a surviving service record the detauls of his illness and treatment are unknown but he would at some point re-join 10DWR.

Pte. Richard Butler (see 20^th September), who had been wounded on 20^th September, was posted back to England.

L.Cpl. Herbert Newton (see 20^th September), who had been wounded on 20^th September, was evacuated to England from 2^nd Canadian General Hospital at Le Treport, travelling onboard the Hospital Ship Carisbroke Castle. On arrival he would be transferred to 3^rd Scottish General Hospital in Glasgow.

Ptes. Fred Morrell (see 17^th October) and John William Procter (see 17^th October), both arrived at 34^th Infantry Base Depot at Etaples, having sailed from Folkestone overnight 26^th/27^th. They were returning to France having been in England since being wounded.

Pte. George Smith (20340) (see 12^th September), who had been in England since reporting sick five months’ previously, was posted back to France from 3DWR at North Shields; he would re-join 10DWR following his arrival at 34^th Infantry Base Depot at Etaples.

Pte. Mark Beaumont (see 14^th September), who had been in England since being wounded in January, being no longer fit for active service, was transferred from 3DWR to 7^th Battalion, Royal Defence Corps.

Pte. Louis Heren (see 25^th September) appeared before an Army Medical Board at 2^nd London General Hospital, Chelsea. The Board found him permanently unfit for further service, having lost both eyes when wounded on 20^th September. He was to be transferred to St. Dunstan’s Hospital for further treatment.

At home in Grindleton, John Crossley died aged 53; he was the father of Pte. Joshua Crossley, (see 17^th October), who, despite being only 16, had been one of Tunstill’s original recruits but had died of measles while the Battalion was in training in November 1914.

Pte. Joshua Crossley

The weekly edition of the Keighley News reported on the death of Pte. Thomas Thompson MM (see 20^th September);

BRITISH AND FRENCH MILITARY MEDALLIST KILLED

Private Thomas Thompson, West Riding Regiment, of 83 King Street, Keighley, has been officially reported killed in action near Ypres. A fortnight ago Mrs. Thompson had a letter from a comrade of her husband’s stating he had been killed. A month before he was home for leave and had brought with him many trophies from battlefields in France and Belgium. Private Thompson was awarded the Military Medal for gallant conduct in October 1916 and early this year was presented with the French Military Medal by the General of his Division. He wrote a pathetic letter to his wife in which he said that if anything happened to him his medals were to be given to his son David, aged ten years old.

The official record of the brave deed for which Private Thompson was awarded the Military Medal was as follows: “On the 4^th of October 1916 in front of Le Sars, he found and dashed through a gap in the enemy’s wire, called out its position to his comrades and urged them to follow. Getting to the enemy’s parapet he picked up enemy bombs which were lying there and threw them into the enemy trench and then stood on the enemy parapet calling out for more bombs”.

Corporal Jennings (Cpl. James Jennings (11270), see 20^th September) who was charging the enemy’s wire on the morning of September 20^th describes the battle thus in a letter to his widow, “How I got through this terrible battle God only knows. The biggest shells were used by the Germans and it was hell upon earth. I am sorry that I have to be the bearer of the sad news of Private Thompson’s death. It was at 5.30 on September 20^th that my Company went over the top to attack the German trenches. I was going on and Tommy was by my side. We captured the first German trenches and a lot of prisoners and then we captured the second German line trenches. While we were charging a shell fell in my Company. A part of it hit Tommy and knocked him over. I told one of our men to dress his wounds as I could not stay with him myself, as we were going on to capture the next trench. When I got back I was sorry to hear that poor Tommy had died. So I hope you will give Mrs. Thompson my deepest sympathy and that of every man in the Company. Tell her that he did his duty like a brave, manly soldier”. Corporal Jennings’ home is also in King Street, Keighley. Private Thompson enlisted soon after the outbreak of war and fought in many of the great battles in France and Belgium for over two years.

(I am most obliged to Edward Wild for the information on Thomas Thompson).

A payment of £6 was authorised, being the amount due in pay and allowances to the late Pte. Christopher Tinker Sykes (see 7^th June), who had been killed in action on 7^th June; the payment would go to his father, Antony.