Thomas Jones, Welsh Regiment

Private, 1719, 2nd Battalion, Welsh Regiment. Died, killed in action, aged 26, on 24 December 1914 on the Western Front.

(There is some discrepancy regarding the exact date of death. CWCG records it as 24 October 1914. However, his 'Medal Index Card' records it as 24 December 1914, as does the 'UK, Army Register of Soldiers' Effects' and also the local newspaper. Unfortunately his Service Record has not survived to resolve this issue. For the purpose of this entry the date of 24 December 1914 has been adopted.)

The 2nd Battalion was at Bordon, Hampshire in August 1914 as part of 3rd Brigade in the 1st Division. It landed at Le Havre on 13 August 1914. Private Jones landed in France on 24 November 1914. It is probable that he arrived at the front early in December as one of 500 replacements from the Battalion Depot. His death came just one month after landing in France.

On the 19th December 1914 the Indian Corps comprising the Lahore and Meerut Divisions were ordered to attack the enemy positions near Festubert and Givenchy. They did so without adequate artillery support and suffered severely during two days of attack and counter-attack. During the afternoon of the 20 December, I Corps sent the 1st (Guards) and 3rd Brigades to the assistance of the hard-pressed Indian Corps. Delayed by dark, water-logged ground and machine-gun fire, they eventually relieved the Manchesters in Givenchy and the remnants of Sirhind Brigade at Festubert. GHQ ordered Haig's I Corps to relieve the shattered Indian Corps, which took place by 22 December. The 1st Division suffered 1,682 casualties in the operations to relieve the Indian Corps. Many of these, and many of the Indian Corps, were victims of exposure and frostbite as they held on without cover in freezing rain and flooded trenches for up to three days. 

The Battalion War Diary records that the battalion operated during this period under constant rifle, machine gun and artillery fire and suffered many losses. The 'Chronicle' of 15 January 1915 reported that his death occurred on 24 December 1914 when a shell struck a loft where he and two others were sheltering. He was the eighth Holyhead victim of the war but one of the first soldiers, the others being lost at sea.

Born in Holyhead, the son of the late Robert Jones of Edmund Street, Holyhead. He was the husband of Grace Jones (nee Edwards), who had died during childbirth, aged 23, in 1910. They had married in 1908 and had one surviving child. In 1911 Thomas was living with his widowed mother, Sarah Jones (69) at 56 Porth-y-Felin, Holyhead. He was employed as a Goods Sorter for the LNWR. He enlisted at Cardiff, being resident at Ty Croes, Anglesey. His brother, William J Jones of 19 Edmund Street, was also a serving soldier in the Royal Welsh Fusiliers.

Awarded the 1914-15 Star, Victory Medal and British War Medal.

Buried in Brown's Road Military Cemetery, Festubert, France. Grave is located at V.B.20.