In memoriam
Private Thomas Dickinson
Thomas Dickinson was born in February 1889 at Melrose, Roxburgh, Scotland, son of Mr and Mrs Joseph Dickinson.
On the outbreak of war he was working as a forester, having previously served 2½ years as an apprentice draper.
On 1 September 1914 he enlisted at Melrose in the 2nd Dragoons (No.6214). He embarked for France on 5 March 1916 but after a month was sent home, spending two months in an Edinburgh hospital with rheumatism.
On 14 June 1916 he returned to France, to join the 2nd North Irish Horse Regiment, probably as part of the headquarters contingent sent from England when the regiment was formed in June 1916.
On 20 September 1917 Private Dickinson was transferred to the 9th Battalion, Royal Irish Fusiliers (No.41078), when the 2nd North Irish Horse Regiment was dismounted and absorbed into that battalion. After a short period of infantry training the men of the regiment were sent to their new battalion on the Cambrai front.
Dickinson and two others were killed in the evening of 26 October 1917 when a shell from an enemy heavy trench mortar scored a direct hit on their Lewis gun post on Yorkshire Bank.
He was buried at Neuville-Bourjonval British Cemetery, grave E.21. The gravestone inscription reads:
41078 PRIVATE
T. DICKINSON
ROYAL IRISH FUSILIERS
26TH OCTOBER 1917
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