Thomas Henry Melhuish was the youngest of the seven children of Vincent Lawrence Melhuish (1890-1944) and Lucy Melhuish née Barnett (1893-1959). His birth was registered in the 1st quarter of 1924 in the Holborn registration district. His father was a harness cleaner who had served during World War One as a sergeant in the Welch Regiment.
Electoral registers show his parents listed from 1920 to 1928 at 28 Ironmonger Street, Islington and from 1930 to 1935 at 109 Collingwood Street, Islington. The 1936 electoral register shows them at 20 Ironmonger Street, London, EC1 and in 1938 at 31 Seward Street, London, EC1.
He enlisted as a Gunner in the Royal Artillery and his service number was 14528929. In the evening of 10 February 1945, aged 21 years, he was attached to their 131st Field Regiment and was one of four members of Major Gordon Thomas Calthrop Campbell's (later Baron Campbell of Croy, 1921-2005) crew who were sheltering in a house near the Siegfried Line when it received a direct hit from a heavy shell and were killed.
They were buried nearby but on 9 December 1946 their bodies were exhumed and he was reburied in Plot 54, Row G, Grave 6 of the Reichswald Forest War Cemetery, Grunewaldstrasse, 47533 Kleve, Germany.
Credit for this entry to: Andrew Behan.
