Stanley Hubert Thorpe

Trooper - Service No.1946 - 2/1st Norfolk Yeomanry

Private - Service No.79168 - Machine Gun Corps

Stanley Hubert Thorpe was born mid 1891 in Pebmarsh, Essex, the son of Henry Thorpe and his wife Ruth (Thurlow). He was one of eleven children, Henry (1875), Edward (1875), Gertrude (1877), Ernest (1879), Alice (1881), Frederick (1883), Edmund (1888), Ruby (1894) and two unknown infants. Edward and the two unknown infants died in infancy and Edmund died in 1909 at the age of 30. Henry and Ruth married in 1874, in Little Stonham, Suffolk, Henry having served in the Coldstream Guards. They initially settled in Hadleigh, Suffolk but moved around south Suffolk and into north Essex while Henry pursued his work as a miller. By the time he was 50 Henry was an invalid, suffering from paralysis, and returned to his home town of Barking with Ruth and his younger children to live out the rest of his days. Henry died in 1913 aged 64 and Ruth in 1934 aged 80.

When Stanley left school we worked on farms and, eventually, became a groom. After a time working with horses at Billingford, near Dereham, he secured a place as groom at Mangreen Hall, Swardeston, working for Walter Somerville Gurney.

On 2nd November 1914 Stanley was embodied for 4 years service in the U.K. with the 2/1st Norfolk Yeomanry Territorial Force. On 15th September 1916 he transferred to the Machine Gun Corps and on the 17th left Devonport bound for Salonica, Greece, with the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force where he arrived on 1st October, joining 85 Company M.G.C. 3 days later. Stanley was hospitalised, suffering from malaria, for several weeks in November-December 1917 and again, at intervals between October 1918 and February 1919. Finally, on 22nd February 1919, he returned to England and on 2nd April 1919 he was disembodied and returned to his peace time job with Walter Somerville Gurney who, by now, had returned to the family seat at North Runcton Hall.

Some 25 pages (many duplicated) of his army records survive from which has been gleaned the above information. We also know he was awarded the British War Medal and Victory Medal.

In 1922 Stanley married Rose Burton, in Norwich and they had a daughter , Barbara, in 1927. It has not been possible to confirm a marriage or death for Barbara at this time. Stanley Thorpe died on 17th April 1954 at his home on Reepham Road, Norwich, aged 62.

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