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SKELTON - IN - CLEVELAND
IN HISTORY
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"WE WILL REMEMBER THEM"
27360 Private FRANK HARKER.
14th Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment.
Formerly 6222 in the Notts and Derby Regiment.
Enlisted at Skelton in Cleveland.
Killed in action, aged about 35, on the 27th of September 1918.
son of Hannah and Robert Harker of 9 Bolckow St, N Skelton, N Yorkshire.
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Fifteen Ravine, British Cemetery, Villers-Plouich, 19k east of Peronne.
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FAMILY:-
1901. Frank, aged 17, was living at 9 Bolckow St, N Skelton and working as a Horsedriver in the Ironstone Mines. Born in Skelton.
His father, Robert, aged 45, was a Deputy in the Mines and had been born in Rosedale, N Yorks.
His mother, Hannah, aged 48, had been born in Pickering, N Yorks. She had had 5 children by 1911 and all were living.
He had three sisters, Lily 16, Rose 13 and Florence 5; and one brother Robert 11, all born in Skelton.
1911. The family are still at 9 Bolckow St, Frank and Robert are both Miners underground and their father is a Back By Deputy.
They have a 30 year old Miner as a boarder.
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WAR SITUATION:-
Frank's Medal card shows that he was first allocated to the Notts and Derby Regiment with Battalion number 6222.
It is not known when or why Frank was transferred to the Warwickshires. This often happened after a soldier had been repatriated to the UK for some reason, usually wounds, and re-posted.
He was not awarded the 1914/15 Star, so the date that he joined his Battalion in France in 1916 or later and any other action he may have been involved in prior to his death in September 1918 is not known.
The 14th Battalion of the Warwickshires were attached to 95th Brigade of the 32nd Division.
In September of 1918 the tide was turning against the Germans and the 32nd Division fought in the Battles of the Hindenberg line, a series of pushes that finally broke through the formidable lines of trenches, barbed wire and concrete emplacements.
The breakthrough occurred on the 29th September 1918 in the Battle of the St Quentin Canal.
Frank was killed on the 28th.
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