TOMKINS Frank

Appears on the Army casualties list for Worcestershire.

A letter from H.J. Winnington, Honorary Secretary of PCC, St James Church, Wollaston dated 17th December 1950 can be found within war records held at Worcestershire Archives requesting that Sergeant Frank Tomkins, Worcestershire and Herefordshire Regiment be added to the county roll of honour.

The following information has been researched by The Black Country Society:
Frank Tomkins was born in Union St., Stourbridge, and his family moved to Vicarage Road, Wollaston.  He attended school at Wollaston and then became a bricklayer.  He enlisted in the Worcesters in 1929 and was a career soldier during the 1930’s.  He left the army on compassionate grounds in 1938 but was recalled on the outbreak of war.  He joined the 1st Battalion and was married in December 1939 to Florence who lived in Lye. Eventually he was promoted to Sergeant.  In 1944 he went with the Worcesters to Normandy and on the 2nd August was transferred to the 1st Herefordshire Regiment, a Territorial Battalion of the King’s Shropshire Light Infantry in the 11th Armoured Division. They fought their way through Normandy via the gruelling battles of Caen, the Bourgebus Ridge and Mont Pincon.  Their next move was the rapid advance from the Seine to Belgium, starting on the 20th August and taking them to Brussels and Antwerp in two weeks.  Then came the setback of Arnhem and Operation Market Garden.  The Herefords crossed into Holland on the 17th September on their way to the bridge at Eindhoven, but beyond it they were strongly attacked on the eastern flank by units of the German 15th Army.  On the 21st Frank Tomkins was sent across the canal at Somerin to establish the state of the enemy front line, but he was shot by a sniper.  Two uncles died in the Great War: George Tompkins at Gallipoli in 1915 and Edward Tompkins on the Somme in 1916.