Name
Thomas William Spurge
1893
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
30/06/1916
22
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
Lance Serjeant
111
Royal Sussex Regiment
11th Bn.
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
British War and Victory medals
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
ST. VAAST POST MILITARY CEMETERY, RICHEBOURG-L'AVOUE
III. T. 9.
France
Headstone Inscription
DEARLY LOVED AND LOVING SON
UK & Other Memorials
Bishop's Stortford Town Memorial, United Reformed Church Memorial, Bishop's Stortford
Pre War
Thomas William Spurge as born in Bishop's Stortford on 25 April 1893 to Charles and Ellen (Nellie) Spurge. On the 1901 Census he was living with his family at The Firs, Warwick Road, Bishop's Stortford, when his father was a Drapers Manager. By the 1911 Census he was a boarder at Green & Son of 25 High Street, Exeter, working as an Assistant Retail Drapery Establishment Worker.
Wartime Service
He enlisted in Eastbourne on 8 September 1914 and served in the South Down Battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment. He was promoted to Lance Corporal on 19 Dec 1914, then Corporal on 16 June 1915 and eventually Lance Sergeant on 19 Feb 1916, just prior to being sent to France on 4 March. He suffered from tonsillitis several times during March and April 1916. It appears that Thomas died in one of the diversionary tactics for the Somme Offensive which was to begin the next day, 1st July 1916. The battle is referred to as the Battle of the Boar’s Head and the losses of the Sussex Regiments were huge. He was killed in action on 30 June 1916.
Additional Information
His father Charles was awarded a war gratuity of £9 and pay owing of £6 9d 8d. His older brother Bert (Charles Herbert) died a few weeks earlier when he was killed in an assault on a German trench. The brothers are both named on the Town Memorial and the United Reformed Church Memorial, Bishop's Stortford.
Acknowledgments
Brenda Palmer
