Name
Frank Burgess
Conflict
First World War
Date of Death / Age
Rank, Service Number & Service Details
269544
Hertfordshire Regiment
1st
Awards: Service Medals/Honour Awards
Not Yet Researched
Cemetery/Memorial: Name/Reference/Country
Headstone Inscription
Not Researched
UK & Other Memorials
Biography
Frank Burgess was born at Harpenden in 1898. He was one of five children born to James and Elizabeth Burgess. James worked as an Agricultural Labourer at the time of the 1901 Census. Around 1903/4 the family moved to Bedmond, where James was employed as a Horseman on a Farm.
The June 1916 Abbots Langley Parish Magazine Roll of Honour listed Frank Burgess for the first time, serving with the Royal Field Artillery (RFA). In the January 1917 Magazine he was recorded with the 1st Hertfordshire’s, and later that year, in September he was reported wounded. The Herts at War Project records show that Frank was wounded in action in the Hertfordshire’s attack at the Langmark Line on 31st July 1917. Two other men from Abbots Langley fought in this action. William Jerram was killed in action and William Buckoke was taken prisoner. The Hertfordshire’s attacked at 3.50am and met stiff opposition. The battalion’s casualties numbered 460 of the 620 men that went “Over the Top”.
Frank recovered from his wounds and continued with the 1st Hertfordshire’s and returned to the ranks in time to face the German Spring Offensive which started on 21st March 1918. The British Front Line was immediately broken, and for several days the situation was desperate and confused. The Abbots Langley Parish Magazine reported in June 1918 that Frank had initially been posted as “Missing”, but it was later confirmed that he had been taken prisoner during the German offensive, and was a Prisoner of War.
In January 1919 the Parish Magazine reported that he had been welcomed back home from a German Prisoner of War camp. In his absence his family had registered him in the Absent Voter Records, and he was listed in the Spring 1919 Record with a rank of Lance Corporal, in the Hertfordshire Regiment, and shown living in Kings Langley. In the Autumn 1919 Absent Voter Record Frank Burgess was shown living in the High Street Abbots Langley.
Frank Burgess survived the War.
Additional Information
Formerly service number 9529.
Acknowledgments
Roger Yapp - www.backtothefront.org
