Pte 50047 Thomas Goodman

Thomas was born in 1878 in Great Barford, Bedfordshire, the son of George Goodman and his wife Emma (née Peck).  His parents, both born in Bedfordshire, married in 1865 and had at least six children.  Thomas had older Charles, Alfred, and Annie, and younger siblings Louisa, and Albert.

 

Thomas was baptised in Great Barford on 26th September 1880.

 

In 1881 his parents are living in (High Street?) Great Barford, with four children. His father is an agricultural labourer, Thomas is 2. Also in the household is his grandmother, Rebecca Goodman, 64, listed as a pauper.

 

In 1891 they are in Baker’s Road, Great Barford, with five children at home.  His father, 44, Charles, 23, and Alfred, 19, are agricultural labourers.  His mother is 43, Thomas is 12, Albert 9, and Louisa 5.  Annie, 15, is a servant in a neighbour’s household.

 

By 1901 Thomas has moved to London and is found as one of four boarders in the household of William McRay and family, at 10 South Wharf Road, Paddington.  He is 22, employed as a carman.

 

In 1911 he is still in Paddington, one of five boarders in the household of a John Roberts, at 12 Union Place, South Wharf Road.  He is single, employed as a carman; his age is given as 30 (he would have been 32).

He enlisted in London and originally served as Private 159836 in the Royal Army Service Corps. Based on the amount of the War Gratuity, he enlisted or was conscripted in about May 1916, when he was 37. 

Following a transfer he served in the 19th Battalion of The King’s Liverpool Regiment as Private No 50047.

 

Thomas’ name appeared in the list of  K.L.R. Wounded published in the Weekly Casualty List on 11th September 1917, during the Third Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele).  He evidently recovered from his wounds and returned to the front. 

 

On 17th December the battalion moved up to Hedge Street Tunnels from Ontario Camp at about 3 p.m., relieving the 2nd Royal Scots Fusiliers. On arrival, working parties were supplied ... for digging communication trench N side of Menin Road and ... for carrying A (?) frames and sheet iron from Plumers Dump to Support Line. 

 

The battalion War Diary for the 18th December records -

“The Battalion was relieved in HEDGE STREET Tunnels by the 20th Bn KLR, the last company leaving HEDGE STREET Tunnels about 5:30 p.m. 

The Battalion arrived in the left sub sector, the relief being complete by 8 p.m.

E Track and the vicinity of the TOWER were shelled heavily with H.E.’s for about an hour.

A good amount of wire was put up during the night.

There were a few casualties during the night, 1 OR being killed and 6 OR wounded.”

 

Thomas was killed in action on 19th December 1917 aged 39. 

Graham Maddox in “Liverpool Pals”, records 4 from the 19th Bn KIA on 19/12/1917:  Ptes. 50595 Arthur W. Beament, 48113 Oswald Cliffe, 202819 George D. Martindale, and 50047 Thomas Goodman.

CWGC shows 5, including L/Cpl 12067 John Dandy.

Thomas was aged 39 when he was killed in action on 19th December 1917.

He now rests at Railway Dugouts Burial Ground in Belgium.

The commune of Zillebeke contains many Commonwealth cemeteries as the front line trenches ran through it during the greater part of the First World War.

Railway Dugouts Cemetery is 2 Kms west of Zillebeke village, where the railway runs on an embankment overlooking a small farmstead, which was known to the troops as Transport Farm. The site of the cemetery was screened by slightly rising ground to the east, and burials began there in April 1915. They continued until the Armistice, especially in 1916 and 1917, when Advanced Dressing Stations were placed in the dugouts and the farm. They were made in small groups, without any definite arrangement and in the summer of 1917 a considerable number were obliterated by shell fire before they could be marked. The names "Railway Dugouts" and "Transport Farm" were both used for the cemetery.

At the time of the Armistice, more than 1,700 graves in the cemetery were known and marked. Other graves were then brought in from the battlefields and small cemeteries in the vicinity, and a number of the known graves destroyed by artillery fire were specially commemorated. The latter were mainly in the present Plots IV and VII.

The cemetery now contains 2,459 Commonwealth burials and commemorations of the First World War. 430 of the burials are unidentified and 261 casualties are represented by special memorials. Other special memorials record the names of 72 casualties buried in Valley Cottages and Transport Farm Annexe Cemeteries whose graves were destroyed in later fighting.

VALLEY COTTAGES CEMETERY, ZILLEBEKE, was among a group of cottages on "Observatory Road", which runs Eastward from Zillebeke village. It contained the graves of 111 soldiers from the United Kingdom and Canada. It was in an exposed position during the greater part of the war.

TRANSPORT FARM ANNEXE was about 100 metres South-East of the Railway Dugouts Cemetery, on the road to Verbrandenmolen. The graves in it were removed to Perth Cemetery (China Wall), Zillebeke, but one officer, whose grave could not found, is specially commemorated here.

The cemetery was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens.

His death was reported in the Bedfordshire Times and Independent on 11th January 1918:

“Great Barford - We regret to report that Pte. T. Goodman, 19th King’s Liverpools, and son of Mr. G. Goodman, was killed in action Dec.19th.”

 

His father George received his Army effects of £15-7s-10d, and a War Gratuity of £8-10s. 

 

Thomas is commemorated on the following Memorials:

Great Barford Memorial situated in the Village Hall

All Saints Church, Great Barford