Died aged 29. 19 March 1889 – 26 Sep 1918
Gunner 69965. Royal Garrison Artillery 116th Siege Battery 77th Brigade.
John, known as Jack,was the son of Robert & Sarah (nee Bridges) Thomas of Park Street, Dunster. Robert was born in Dunster, and Sarah had been born in the neighbouring village of Bilbrook. Robert & Sarah had left Dunster briefly while Robert worked as a miner digging out the Severn Tunnel. By 1888, they were back in Somerset and Jack was born there on the 19th March 1889.
By 1899 the Thomas family had returned to Dunster and were living at Water Street. Jack’s father Robert was a mason’s labourer. A census was taken two years later, in 1891; Robert, Sarah and their children Mary, William, Robert, John and Sarah were living at Rockfoot.
The Thomas family had moved to Water Street, Dunster by the time of the 1901 census and were living next-door-but-one to the family of Alan Ladd, also commemorated on the Dunster memorials. Jack’s parents Robert (an agricultural labourer) and Sarah were both aged 41. Living with them were their children Mary (18, a housemaid domestic), William (14, a baker), Robert (13), Jack (12), Sarah (11) Richard (8), Ambrose (6), Alice (5), Samuel (4), Edwin (2) and Herbert (1).
In total, the Thomases had 17 children, five of whom died in childhood. The family were very poor indeed. The Harriet Fownes Luttrell Charity gave out blankets and coal, and The Luttrell and Elds Charity gave money to “necessitous cases” – about 100 or so villagers got coal, but only 15-20 were deemed necessitous cases and Sarahfeatures in the list of recipients of the 2 charities for every year that names are recorded bar one.
Jack’s father Robert died on 9 March 1909 at Park Street, Dunster, aged 48, of pulmonary tuberculosis which he’d suffered from for 5 years.
Jack’s mother Sarah (50) was still was living at Water Street, Dunster, when the 1911 census was taken, with several of her children; Jack (22) however, had moved to Cardiff and was working as a hotel porter at The Park Hotel, Park Place.
At the time of his enlistment for WW1 (4.12.1915 in Swansea), Jack was working as a Billiard Marker (presided over tournaments) in the Cameron Hotel, High Street, Swansea. Jack’s army service record gives a good physical description of him: he was 26 years old, 5’ 8¾” tall, his girth when fully expanded was 38 inches, and his expansion range was 4 inches. He had tattoo marks on his right arm and his “left arm finger”. His medical history, taken on 8.11.1915 records that he had a corn on his left foot, and false teeth in his upper jaw. Another medical history, taken 7.3.1916 in Cardiff, gives his weight as 145 lbs and states that he was of good physical development. He was vaccinated 3 times in infancy. Vision in his right eye was 6/12 and in his left 6/9. He had tattoos on his right arm and left ring finger. It also mentions the corn on his left foot and notes that the third toe on his left foot was slightly deformed. He had false upper teeth, dental treatment required. He had prominent veins in both legs.
Jack was a gunner in the Royal Garrison Artillery. The RGA was responsible for the heavy, large calibre guns and howitzers that were positioned some way behind the front line. RGA Siege Batteries had the largest guns and howitzers, mounted on railways or on massive fixed concrete emplacements and consequently rather immobile. As British artillery tactics developed, the Siege Batteries were most often employed in destroying or neutralising the enemy artillery, as well as putting destructive fire down on strongpoints, dumps, store, roads and railways behind enemy lines (The Long, Long Trail website).
Jack arrived in France on the 18 June 1916. On the 27th May 1918 Jack was injured and reported missing in action. According to information from the International Red Cross, Jack was captured in Craonne and interned in the PoW hospital at Worms. Worms was in the Hesse region of Germany. The information from the Red Cross states that his rank was that of Private at the time of his capture.
On 31st July 1918 Jack’s brother-in-law Charles Denman wrote to the Officer in Charge of RGA Records, Dover: “Referring to your notification of 24th June last that the above had been missing since the 27th May last, I am indeed glad to say that I have today received a postcard from the British Red Cross Enquiry Department for wounded and missing saying that ‘the name of Gunner Jack Thomas 69965 RGA has come through to us on a list of P/W in Germany. Camp unknown.’”
Although Charles didn’t know it, Jack was in Prisoner of War Hospital, Worms, in Germany. A Prisoner of War who was a patient at Worms Hospital Nov 6 – Jan 12, 1917 – approximately 17 months before Jack was sent to Worms, gave this account of his time there:
“At Worms the medical attention was all right. The doctor was good and could talk a little English. While there I had a visit from Mr Nicholl, the secretary of the YMCA. The food was bad. Very little, only soup and turnips; very seldom any meat. This was a hospital confined to prisoners. The food in the general hospital in Belgium was much better.
“When I arrived there, there were four Englishmen altogether – Sims, Smith of the 1st K.O.S.B.’s, and Tancred of the 1st K.O.S.B. Tancred had water on the lungs. Smith, trouble with his chest. They had been in Sennelager camp before and Tancred had passed the board to go to England.
“Smith told me he had been badly used by Germans in a place called Windau, in Russian Poland.
“He told me they had to be up at 4 in the morning and had to work till late hours in the night and the food very bad.
“This hospital was the hospital of the Russian Prison Camp, and the Russians in that hospital were dying every day. I have seen the Russians receive toasted bread and biscuits from Russia, and when these came in the Germans would stop their bread ration. The Russians were worse treated than the English. The Russians had never seen any English before.”
On the 5th August 1918 Charles Denman wrote again to The Officer in Charge of RGA Records, Dover: “as desired by your letter of 2nd which I received today, I am enclosing the card which I received from the Red Cross Society notifying me that the above is a Prisoner of War in Germany. Will you please return this card as soon as possible? PS Should you by any chance get to know the name of his camp in Germany will you please let me know?”
The RGA Record Office, Dover replied, saying “I am in receipt of your letter of the 4th inst. And in reply I am unable to give you any further information concerning No. 69965 Gunner John Thomas. It is most probable that you will be the first to hear from him again, but should information reach this office stating the name of the camp in which he is detained, I will certainly notify you.” Sadly by this time Jack died on 26.9.1918 at 9:30am of dysentery.
On the 27th November 1918 Charles Denman wrote to The Officer in Charge of RGA Records Dover: “I am enclosing a communication which has just been received by the mother of Gunner John Thomas No. 69965 of the 116th Siege Battery, RGA, who was taken a Prisoner of War in May last and who afterwards on 17th June sent me a postcard which reached me early in August and which said ‘I am a Prisoner of War in Germany and sound.’ Since the receipt of that postcard by me I cannot find that any other communication has been received from him by anyone. I am now writing with reference to deceased’s back pay to his widowed mother and also in relation to her being granted a pension. Will you kindly let me know what steps should be taken. I am a brother in law to the deceased. PS Is there any chance of the Red Cross Society having made a mistake?” It may be my imagination, but I wonder if the last question were the words of Jack’s grieving mother.
A letter of 3rd December 1918 confirmed their worst fears: “The Officer in Charge of RGA Records Dover is informed that a certificate has been received from Prisoner of War Hospital, Worms, reporting the death of No 69965 Gnr Thomas RGA on 26.9.1918 in Prisoner of War Hospital Worms.”
Jack was buried in the cemetery of Worms-Hochheim in Germany. Worms (Hochheim Hill) Cemetery contains a substantial plot of Allied prisoner of war burials. Among these are the graves of 113 Commonwealth servicemen who died in 1918. The names of the dead (including Jack) are inscribed on a screen wall in the Allied Plot. There is no individual grave marking. He is commemorated on the plaques in St George’s Church and on the Memorial Hall in Dunster, Somerset.
In his will dated 17th July 1916, Jack left “all my belongings to my mother, Mrs S Thomas, Park Street, Dunster.”
