Frank Scutt 1883-1916

Notes [F S the son of a chalk pit worker, living up to 1916 at 198 Jessamine Cottage, Cocking Street, Midhurst.] [Military service. Frank enlisted at Hastings on 3 December 1914, joining the 3rd South Downs Battalion which became the 13th (Service) Battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment, where he achieved the rank of Lance Corporal. He went to France on 5 March 1916. In July 1916, the offensive on the Somme began; on the first day of the “Big Push”, Frank was wounded in the chest, although he soon recovered. Despite 85,000 British casualties in the Battle of Albert, the British breached the first line of German defences north of the Somme River. However they were now faced with a complete second line of defences which extended along the ridge of high ground from Thiepval in the north to the villages of Guillemont and Ginchy in the south. On 20 July, Frank was attached to the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment, where he fought alongside his wife’s brother, Jesse Moulding. Death and commemoration - It was during this second phase of the Battle of the Somme that Lance Corporal Frank Scutt was killed on 23 July 1916. In the assault on the village of Pozieres, the 1st British Division attacked the western end of a defensive line, known as “Munster Alley”. They had to pass through a barrage before assembling, and subsequently, while creeping forward to assault, were seen by the enemy in the light of his flares. Heavy machine-gun fire was opened, and the leading companies of the 2nd Royal Sussex lost all their officers but one, and 109 men; of these 116 men, one officer and 24 men were killed. Frank Scutt’s body was never recovered and he is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial to the “Missing of the Somme” who have no known grave, as well as on the Cocking War Memorial. His obituary in the West Sussex Gazette said that Frank died “For England and home”. “Christ will link the broken chain, when in Heaven we meet again”.]