Family :

Service Life:

Campaigns:

• The First World War 1914-1918, World-wide.

9 April - 16 June 1917. The Arras Offensive consisted of a series of linked attacks starting with the Anglo Canadian assault on the dominant Vimy Ridge feature through the battles in the Scarpe River valley and up to the assaults on the Hindenburg line in the summer of 1917.

Detail :

Cpl. Thomas William Nicholls, No. 1963. Household Bn. (Household Cavalry and Cavalry of the Line (inc. Yeomanry and Imperial Camel Corps)). Killed in Action 3rd May 1917. Age 39

Thomas appears to have signed on with The Norfolk Regiment, Imperial Yeomanry on 19th January 1900 and may well have fought in the 2nd Boer War, also called The South African war 1899 - 1902. This would explain his being posted to, or called up into the Household Bn. ( The following details are taken, with thanks, from "The Long Long Trail", the website of Chris Baker) This unusual unit was formed as an infantry battalion at Knightsbridge Barracks in London on 1 September 1916. The troops were drawn from the reserve units of the Household Cavalry. Much retraining and re-equipment was necessary to convert the cavalry troops into foot soldiers, capable of conducting the increasingly mechanised war on the Western Front. It landed in France as a unit on 9 November 1916 and shortly afterwards was posted to join the 10th Brigade of the 4th Division, an experienced formation of the regular army that had been in France since August 1914. The Division was heavily engaged for the first time in the Battle of Arras in April 1917. Thomas William was the son of Thomas William, a Journeyman Miller, and Margaret Nicholls and was born in the 2nd quarter of 1878 in Great Yarmouth, one of six children shown in the 1891 census and described as an errand boy. Thomas married Ada Crane in 2nd quarter of 1907 and the 1911 census shows them living in Albert Road, Framlingham, with two children and a 14 year old servant. Thomas is shown as a Corn Merchant's Clerk.

Commemorated: Arras Memorial. Ref: Bay 1.

Masonic :

Merchant's Clerk from Framlingham, "Killed in action March 1917."

Source :

The project globally acknowledges the following as sources of information for research across the whole database:

• The Commonwealth War Graves Commission
• The (UK) National Archives
• Ancestry.co.uk - Genealogy, Family Trees & Family History online
• ugle.org.uk - The records of the United Grand Lodge of England including the Library and Museum of Freemasonry

Additional Source:

• Founder Researchers : Paul Masters & Mike McCarthy
• Researcher : Bruce Littley
• Provincial Research : W.Bro. Rod Gibson (Suffolk)