Whitty, Thomas Arthur

BORN HULL 1900. SON OF JOHN & MARY ANN WHITTY, NEWARK, NOTTINGHAMSHIRE & ABOVE ADDRESS (1911 CENSUS). HE SERVED WITH THE HULL PALS. IS BURIED AT LE GRAND HASARD MILITARY CEMETERY, MORBECQUE, NORD, FRANCE. HIS GRAVE INSCRIPTION, READS, “HE DIED THAT THOSE HE LOVED MIGHT LIVE”.
Hull Pals Memorial Post. PRIVATE THOMAS ARTHUR WHITTY 51096. Born in October 1899, Thomas was the second of four children and eldest son of John and Mary Ann Whitty of 33 Craven Street, Hull. Although born in the city, Thomas’s father was a boiler-maker in the shipyards and had moved to Newark at the turn of the century taking his family with him. By the time the war broke out they were back in Hull and Thomas, when he came of age, enlisted in the 11th Battalion East Yorkshire Regiment what had been, three long years before, the 2nd Hull Pals. By the time Thomas helped swell the ranks at the start of 1918, there were few Originals left and the battalion was a very different one to that which had proudly marched through the city amid flags and bunting and wild cheers when the war was still a great adventure and the casualty lists had yet to hit home. Thomas Whitty became yet another name on those lists on 9th August 1918. He is buried in Lle Grand Hasard Military Cemetery; he was 18 years old.