Early Life :

Service Life:

Campaigns:

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

"The Battle of Loos (25 September to 18 October 1915) was the major battle on the Western Front in 1915, surpassing in every respect all that had gone before in terms of numbers of men and materiel committed to battle. The preliminary bombardment was the most violent to date and the battle was charaterised by the committment of Regular and Territorial battalions on a large scale, in which the Territorials performed just as well as the Regulars. As the battles on the Western Front in 1915 increased in size and violence, so the casualties increased in proportion: Neuve Chapelle 12,000, Aubers Ridge/Festubert 29,000 , Loos 60,000. 1916 was to take the casualty cost to another level. Loos was intended as a minor role in support of French efforts around Arras but circumstances reduced the French effort. It marked the first use of poison gas by the British. Once the initial assualt had failed the battle continued in a series of actions mostly focused on the northern sector around the tactically important Hohenzollern Redoubt."

Detail :

Received a commission into K.R.R.C. on 1 September 1900. During the Great War he served with the 12th Battalion, Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire Regiment, and died of wounds received in action at Loos, on 28 September 1915. He is buried at Abbeville Communal Cemetery, France.

Dix Noonan & Web - Auctioneers:
The following is extracted from a moving letter written to his widow by Sister Margaret Blander, No. 12 Ambulance Train, who nursed Captain Dickins through the final hours of his life. It was included as part of the sale of his service medals at Dix, Noonan & Web in 2002 (£650).

‘...Your husband was brought on my train on the 27th September about 7p.m. He had a gunshot wound of his back, the wound in itself was small, but the spine must have been injured, as his legs were both paralysed. We got him made comfortable on his bed, he himself saying that he wanted nothing more now than a drink of water. He suffered no pain. He had sips of milk, water, and beef tea. About 10:00p.m. he fell asleep and slept about one hour. He did not sleep again, but said he had no pain, only thirsty, and he drank quite a lot, but would have nothing but water. He would have talked on, but I tried to get him over to sleep again, thinking a sleep would do so much for him. The only thing he was thinking of was the thought of getting home. He knew he was critically ill and asked me if I thought he should ever be able to cross over. Then he told me if I just gave him one other drink, he felt like sleeping. I gave him his drink, and he had only finished it when I saw a change and he just quietly breathed his last. There was no struggle, nothing could have been more peaceful. He never spoke again. His face was beautiful in it’s calmness and he looked at peace. He died about 10:00a.m. on the morning of the 28th September...

How often I think of the mothers, the wives and the sweethearts that are left to wait at home. I dread to think of England, it is a land of sorrow and mourning...’"

Masonic :

Listed as a 24 year old Wine Merchant resident at 7 Cavendish Road, Regent's Park at the time of his initiation in to the Victoria Rifle's Lodge No 822. His elder brother, Vernon William Frank Dickens was initiated, passed and raised on the same dates, both receiving their Grand Lodge Certificates at the same time, on New Year's Eve, 1895.

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
• Researcher : Tom Hawley