262032 Pte. Thomas Hopps British Army 20th (1st Tyneside Scottish) Btn. Northumberland Fusiliers from:Binchester, Co. Durham (d.1st Jul 1916) Before the war, Thomas Hopps (1891-1916) worked at Westerton Colliery. At age 27, just before the war broke out, he married Florence Robinson. He joined up with a Pals' Battalion in 1915 - the 20th Northumberland Fusiliers (1st Tyneside Scottish).
Four of these battalions made up the 102nd (Tyneside Scottish) Brigade. While an application for kilt or trews was rejected, they were granted pipe bands and use of the Glengarry cap, with a small patch of tartan to be added behind the fusilier's badge after the soldier's first action. The CSM joked that if enough of them got killed the survivors could club together to make a kilt from the remaining patches.
At Christmas 1915, they were granted their first home leave but reported back to barracks a day late. Although it looks like this was a genuine administrative error, it was decided to make an example of them anyway and they were placed in the first wave of the Battle of the Somme on the 1st July 1916. After two huge mines were exploded in the sector, they were sent over the top at 7.30am to attack the fortified village of La Boiselle, across 3km of open ground in the face of withering German machine gun fire. By 8 o'clock there were just a handful of survivors. The Tyneside Scottish suffered the worst casualties of any brigade that day. The 1st Battalion (about 800 men) lost 584 men, the 3rd lost 537 men while the 4th Battalion lost 629. All four battalion commanders were killed. In total, the British lost 5,000 at Ovillers; the Germans only 280.
As they went 'over the top' each company was played over by their pipers, and they played on as they advanced into a deadly crossfire from machine guns. In a matter of about 10 minutes some 80 per cent of the leading battalions had become casualties, including all four Tyneside Scottish Battalion commanders and 15 out of the 16 company commanders. Many senior NCOs had also been killed or wounded. One old soldier remarked, 'It took twelve months to build our battalion but just twelve minutes to destroy it'.
The body of Thomas Hopps was found at Trench Map reference 57d X14, to the north of La Boiselle. He was exhumed from a temporary grave with a wooden cross that he shared with an unknown corporal of the Middlesex Regiment and reburied at Ovillers Military Cemetery XIII. F. 4. He is also commemorated on a plaque ('Pvte T. Hopps N.F.') in Whitworth Church, in the grounds of Whitworth Hall.
His name appears on the Somme Roll of Honour.
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