Early Life :

Education & Career :

Clerk to Builder (1891) Political Agent (1899), Parliamentary Registration Secretary (1901), Secretary (1908) Political Organiser & Secretary (1911)

Service Life:

Campaigns:

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

In October 1915 a combined Franco-British force of some two large brigades was landed at Salonika (today called Thessalonika) with the objective to help the Serbs in their fight against Bulgarian aggression. However before they could be employed the Serbs were beaten. Over the next three years the Salonika front was static, with heavily fortified trench lines, and only minor adjustments by both sides. More troops were sent to Salonika particularly after the withdrawal from Gallipoli. Disease and climate were no lesser enemies than the Turks.

Detail :

Thomas enlisted into the Royal Marines in January of 1882 as a schoolmaster, and went on to see service in Egypt 1886-7, and was awarded the Bronze Star. He came back to England and at Chatham, on 6 March 1889 he married Elizabeth Susannah Broomfield of 25 Longley Road, Tooting, South West London. The following year, he was serving in the Far East in Burma and was awarded the India Medal with the Burma clasp. Wounded in action with the Naval Brigade in Upper Burma on 25 February 1890, he was invalided out on 13 May 1890.

Thomas then went to West Africa, but the climate didn’t agree with him, and he returned back to Chatham and obtained a position at a local shipbuilders until 1894. By this time, he had developed a great interest in politics and was successful in becoming the agent to the Conservative MP for Devizes in Wiltshire, Sir E A Goulding, with whom he worked until 1896. Thomas then moved to Ulverston as agent for tMr R Cavendish, but later, Lord Cavendish. At this period, he himself had joined the Territorial Force in the 4th King’s Own Royal Lancashire Regiment, and helped to organise the Territorial Companies for the South African War. Later, he moved to Rye in Sussex as the agent for the Conservative, Mr G L Courthorpe, and became Secretary to the Tariff Reform League in 1908.

On 5 August 1914, Thomas reported back at Chatham for war service, but was deemed medically unfit at the age of 49 but not to be perturbed; he gained a commission with the Supply Department of the Army Service Corps. He was gazetted as a Captain on 20 October 1914, and went with the British Expeditionary Force to France five days later. On 26 March 1915, he was promoted to the rank of Major. He had gone out with the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force to Salonica, and it was here while on active service that he caught dysentery and pneumonia, and died on 14 October 1915, his 50th birthday, on board HM Hospital Ship, Carisbrook Castle.

He was posthumously Mentioned in Despatches by Field Marshall Sir John French in the London Gazette of 1 January 1916, for gallant and distinguished conduct in the field. Thomas was awarded the 1914 Star, British War Medal, and Victory Medal, with an oak leaf clasp to attach to the ribbon, awarded for Mentioned in Despatches.

Thomas was originally buried at the Anglo-German Cemetery, later called the Salonika Protestant Cemetery, his headstone having these words across two lines, ‘THOUGH LOST TO SIGHT, TO MEMORY DEAR’. With the later establishment of concentration cemeteries, he was one of eleven moved to Kirechkoi-Hortakoi Military Cemetery, two kilometres north of Thessalonika, Greece and is now buried in Grave 643.

Probate record shows: BAGLEY, Thomas William Ashton of Belcot, 25 Longley Road, Tooting, Surrey. Major, Army Service Corps. Died 14th November 1915 at sea on active service. Probate granted at London 6th January to Elizabeth Susannah Bagley - widow. Effects £2349 6s 6d.

Masonic :

Thomas William Aston Bagley was initiated into the Lodge of Furness No 995 on 5 December 1899, age 34 and residing at Morecambe View, Ulverston, occupation given as political agent. He was passed to the second degree on 9 March 1900, third degree 1 May with his Grand Lodge certificate issued on 19, December 1900. He would also become a member of FURNESS CHAPTER, No. 995 being exalted in 1904, his residence given as Tunbridge Wells and occupation as Election Agent. In the Chapter record of 1914, he is described as "a Secretary, residing Belcot, Longley Road, Tooting, London SW."

He became a joining member to Arthur John Brogan Lodge No. 1715 at Grange over Sands on 10 January 1902, a political agent age 36. On 27 1904 Thomas joined the Abbey Lodge No 1184 at Battle, while residing in Tunbridge Wells, and on 14 May 1908 he became a joining member of West Lancashire Lodge No 3088, which although having Imperial Lodge No 2711 of Liverpool as its petitioner, met in London.

Thomas is commemorated on page 30 of the Roll of Honour Book published by United Grand Lodge in 1921 as Bagley, T.W.A. Major, with the index on page 115 showing two lodge’s against his name, 995 and 3088.

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 : Geoff Cuthill