19527 Private Thomas Rowley

19527 Private Thomas Rowley was born in Newchapel in 1895 he was one of two son’s to Luke and Mary Ann Rowley (nee Durber), Thomas’s parents married in 1894 in St Thomas Church, Mow Cop. Thomas’s grandfather Thomas Durber was the owner of the “beerhouse” called the Nag’s Head in Harrishead, then his uncle Enoch Durber bought the premises off Thomas in 1854 and sold it in 1898 (now called the Royal Oak). Thomas’s occupation was a coal miner like his father and he was unmarried.

Thomas enlisted in Tunstall after 1916, there are no surviving Military records for him and his Medal Index Card doesn’t give a lot of details, only that he was entitled to the Victory Medal and the British War Medal, he was killed on the 30^th November 1917 age 22, his body was never found, he is remembered on Panel 2 on the Cambrai Memorial, Loverval, Northern France, he is also remembered on the family grave in St Thomas’s churchyard.