Poperinghe Old Military Cemetery
Ian Murray has submitted the following:-
Thomas was born at Newhouse near Waterhouses in 1885. In 1901 he was living with his mother and stepfather at 17, Church Street, Quebec where he was a miner, as were three of his four brothers. In 1905 he married Annie Robinson at Durham Registry Office. By the time of the 1911 census they had had four children of which only one had survived (Thomas William born 1906) and they lived in Framwellgate, Durham. They had another child, Harold, in 1913.
Thomas enlisted in October 1914 and joined his regiment on 4th November 1914 at Beverley. He was posted overseas on 10th February 1915 by which time his wife was expecting another child.
On the 1st March 1915 Thomas’s wife gave birth to Lawrence. On that very same day, Thomas sustained a gunshot wound to the abdomen and died at No. 85 Field Ambulance Unit the following day. He is buried in Poperinghe Old Military Cemetery.
The family suffered another tragedy only four months later when the eldest child, Thomas William was found drowned in the River Wear in Durham near the old mill on 4th July.
Annie Cheston married in 1917 and became Annie Wheatman.
Thomas’ brother, Stephen also served in WW1 and died at the Pensions Hospital, Elisabethville, Birtley in 1920.
Another brother, George also served, first in the DLI then in the Machine Gun Corps. He survived but his son, Thomas, was drowned at sea in WW2 while serving with the Royal Marines.
Awards: 1915 Star; British War Medal; Victory Medal.
Thomas Cheston is remembered at Lanchester on L62.01 L62.02 and L62.04 and at Durham on D47.054 and D47.125
