Private Thomas George Bertram Armstrong
Number: 11254
Company: 61st (South Irish Horse) Company (Dublin), 17th Battalion
ENLISTMENT
Date: 25 January 1900
Place: Newbridge
Age: 20 years
Trade of calling: None
Place of birth: In the Parish of Stradbally, near the Town of Stradbally, in Queens County.
Family: Single. Father the Rev. Robert Armstrong, mother Charlotte E. Armstrong (nee Fishbourne), The Rectory, Stradbally.
Previous military service: No
Description: Height 5' 11 3/4". Complexion fair, eyes grey, hair dark.
Religion: Other Protestant
ACTIVE SERVICE
Date to South Africa: 7 April 1900
Campaigns: South Africa 1899-1902
Service medal, clasps and other awards: Queen's South Africa Medal; Rhodesia clasp.
DEATH
Date: 7 August 1900
Place: Marandellas
Cause: Dysentery/ meningitis
Buried/ commemorated: Paradise Plot Cemetery, Marandellas
At Marandellas died one of the Dublin Squadron - Trooper Armstrong - and he was buried in the little enclosure newly formed within the edge of the woods westward of the camp. (Sharrad H. Gilbert, Rhodesia - And After: Being the Story of the 17th and 18th Battalions of the Imperial Yeomanry in South Africa, 1901.)
The 61st, which is one of the Dublin Companies of the Imperial Yeomanry has had some cases of fever since it landed at Beira, in Rhodesia, and moved thence southwards into the Transvaal. Unfortunately they were not all cases of recovery. It would appear that Trooper Thomas George B. Armstrong was first attacked with enteric, which developed into meningitis. This disease, which almost always carries off the patient, proved no exception, as the poor yound fellow, who was only 20 years of age, and consequently not a seasoned soldier fit to stand such a disease, died on 7th August, at Marandellas. He was third son of the Rev. Chancellor Armstrong, D. D., Rector of Stradbally. (Leinster Reporter, 18 August 1900.)
Images above sourced from the Zim Field Guide site.
This page last updated 26 July 2024.