The 1911 census records – mostly in Welsh- the Bagshaw family living at Sheldon Road Halkyn, Flintshire. The head of the family (‘penteulu’) was James Bagshaw a 48 year old ‘stoker for engines at lead mine’ who had been born in the parish of Tryffynnon (Holywell). His wife was Mary 44 a native of Halkyn. Their 18 year old daughter Hannah was a seamstress ( gwniadferch) and there were four sons at school Thomas 12, Robert John 10, Ernest 7 and William 5. The eldest boy Arthur was 16 and a spinner in the silk works.
UK soldiers who Died in the Great War, accessible on www.ancestry.co.uk tells us that he enlisted in Mold, Flintshire.
There is a Flintshire Roll of Honour card for him at the County Archives Office at Hawarden signed by his father James. It gives the address as Woodlands, Halkyn. It tells us poignantly that the length of Thomas’s service in the army was just 3 weeks and that he died at Kimnel Park Camp.
