Jean Longstaff has submitted the following:-
Alice Currie from Berwick on Tweed married Thomas Sigsworth in South Shields in 1871 and ten years later she was sharing a house in Havelock Street with their two young daughters Catherine and Margaret and the Wallace family whilst Thomas was away at sea. The 1891 census shows that father Thomas was now land based and working as a foreman at the docks whilst Alice was at home with her mother in law, also called Alice, and four children, Kate, Maggie, young Thomas born on 16th July 1882, and 6-year-old James.
On 30th July 1900, eighteen-year-old Thomas who had been a member of the 3rd Durham Volunteer Artillery based in South Shields, enlisted in the Royal Horse Artillery becoming Driver 11643 with the 1901 census showing him based at St John’s Wood Barracks, London. Extending his service, in June 1904 he was mustered as a Gunner and posted to India where he served for eight years before returning to England in February 1912 where he was discharged on 29th July.
Almost immediately Thomas left for Canada and a 1913 directory shows that he had settled in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan where on 16th July 1914 he married Sunderland born Sarah Wilson. Thomas enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force on 29th May 1915 in Moose Jaw, naming Sarah as his next of kin and mentioning his twelve years in the Royal Horse Artillery. Thomas became Private 104722 of the 68th Battalion and sailed with them to England. December 1915 saw him a Gunner at Westenhanger, Kent attached to the 7th Brigade Canadian Field Artillery, and in January he was transferred to the 3rd Trench Mortar Battery based at Shorncliffe Camp.
Travelling to France in April he joined his unit at Poperinghe, Belgium and just five weeks later he was reported as missing presumed dead after an attack at Sanctuary Wood on 3rd June 1916.
Thomas Currie Sigsworth is remembered in Sunderland on S140.048 part 9 page 202
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 Gunner Sigsworth
