Those who gave their lives from Yarm ______________________________________

HYLAND, Thomas. Pte M2/119185 884th Mech Transport Coy, RASC attd XIXth Corps Heavy Artillery.

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The following was taken from the Yorkshire Regiment website

Died of accidental injuries 3 Nov 1918 aged 32. Lijssenthoek Mil Cem, Poperinghe, Belgium

Yarm1914 believe that Thomas Hyland was married to David Rigg’s 2nd cousin Gertrude. The Rigg family were butchers in Yarm from 1896 until David’s retirement in 2012 and always remember Thomas on Remembrance Sunday as his name is read out. Gertrude lived at Tunbridge House in Yarm High Street and aged 25 married Thomas Hyland aged 29 on 2nd June 1915 at St Mary and St Romuald Church in Yarm High Street. The marriage certificate records the church as St Mary's Roman catholic Chapel, Yarm and Thomas's profession as chauffeur. Little is known about Thomas history except he was born in Portarlington in Queens County (now Laois), Southern Ireland in 1886. His father was also called Thomas Hyland and was a coachman and died before the wedding.Thomas signed up in West hartlepool on 25th August 1915 and joined the Mechanical Transport Company.

Routinely, from 1915 onwards, large artillery pieces were moved by purpose-built caterpillar tracked, or wheeled, tractors as these heavy guns were beyond the hauling capacity of even teams of six or eight draught horses or mules. Such heavy equipment was kept at Army Service Corps (ASC) Siege Parks from which also operated the Ammunitions Columns that kept the gun batteries supplied.

As the pool of motor and traction vehicles increased on the Western Front the complexity of the ASC involvement expanded and reorganisation and rationalisation grew apace. The mechanised vehicle quickly gained an important role in all forms of transport. It rose from a total of just over 500 assorted mechanical vehicles in the ASC world-wide at the outbreak of the Great War in 1914, to around 105,000 at the Armistice in November 1918 and ranged from motor cycles to huge tractors.

In 1918 the 884th Mechanical Transport Company was attached to the 19th Corps Heavy Artillery. The grave registration document records that Thomas died of accidental injuries. His family believe that a heavy artillery gun was being moved down a hill and it ran over Thomas. His war memorial is in Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery in Belgium. After the war Gertrude was left to bring up their son Bert. She then married Mr Campion and lived at 2, Mansfield Villas in Thornaby-on-Tees.

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Yarm 1914 Research ________________

The Yarm 1914 Commemoration Group is carrying out research on the soldiers listed. We are finding where they lived in Yarm and will represent the findings in a wall of poppies presentation. More details will be posted on Facebook, Twitter and this web site. If you have any information please contact us. Left click on the picture below.