Thomas Rutherford

Jean Longstaff has submitted the following:-

Thomas was born on 1st February 1887 in Houghton-le-Spring to Scottish born father John Rutherford who was a jobbing gardener and Jane Johns who he had married in Tynemouth in 1876. By 1901 he was a caretaker for the Urban District Council, but died four years later leaving Jane with six children. The 1911 census shows that all the family, Annie, John, Emily, William, Thomas and George, were still living with their mother in Edwin Street, Houghton-le-Spring and that Thomas, now aged 24 was working as a joiner in the building trade.

It is not known when Thomas arrived in Canada, but by 1915 he was living in Hamilton, Ontario, was working as a carpenter and had joined the local militia. He enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force on 27th July 1915 posted to the 76th Battalion with the regimental number 141116 and within four weeks had had been appointed Quartermaster Sergeant at their base at Camp Niagara. The battalion sailed to England from Halifax, Nova Scotia, leaving Canada on 23rd April 1916 on the SS Empress of Britain to be billeted on arrival in the camp at West Sandling, Kent where Thomas became acting Battalion Quarter Master Sergeant.

Transferred to the 36th Battalion in July as a Corporal, the following month he was playing football on the line when he fell on his wrist with the full weight of his body, breaking both bones in his forearm. In hospital at Shorncliffe he was transferred to Ramsgate and not discharged until November when he spent time at Hastings at the Canadian Corps Depot. Returning to the 36th at West Sandling in January 1917, after a Medical Board had said that although there was some deformity to his wrist there was no disability, he became QMS with the 3rd Reserve Battalion until July when he reverted to being Sergeant at his own request, and four months later, again at his own request to Private so that he could go overseas with the 4th Battalion.

He joined the 4th as a reinforcement after their losses at Passchendaele, and after five months was appointed Lance Corporal to complete the establishment and then in September 1918 Lance Sergeant. In the fighting at Cagnicourt on 3rd September, where there were many casualties, Sergeant Rutherford was wounded in his back, but after treatment at No.11 Field Ambulance returned to duty the same day. Within a month the Battalion was preparing for battle at Cambrai and on 1st October 1918 they attacked Abancourt and the war diary states “they fought forward with unsurpassed bravery under murderous machine gun and artillery fire”.

Killed in this attack, Thomas Rutherford was posthumously awarded the Military Medal.

Thomas Rutherford is remembered in Houghton-le-Spring on H132.01 and H132.02

He is also remembered in Canada on their Virtual War Memorial and in their Book of Remembrance.

Canadian Book of Remembrance
Canadian Virtual War Memorial
The CWGC entry for Lance Sergeant Rutherford