Second Lieutenant Thomas Hood

Second Lieutenant Thomas Hood, 3rd Battalion ( attached 7th Battalion ) Suffolk Regiment. He was killed in action in France on 12th October 1916 during the Battle of the Somme, aged 40. He had been born in Makerstoun, Roxburghshire and was the only son of the late Thomas and Robina Hood of High Street, Coldstream and Bogend, Duns and the husband of the late Mary Todd Hood of Wellnage, Duns and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial, Thiepval, France. He had been educated at George Watson’s school in Edinburgh where he had won the ” Dudgeon ” prize for mathematics. He then went to work in the Solicitor’s office of Mr Ferguson in Duns before moving to work as a Land Agent for the Hon. Mrs Cecil Ives Moynes at Halstead, Essex. In 1905 he went to Egypt as Manager of the Garbieh Land Co. He returned home on the outbreak of War to enlist in the Suffolk Regiment. As he had been a Captain in the old 2nd Volunteer Battalion, Suffolk Regiment he was awarded a commission in August 1915. He is also commemorated on his parent’s headstone in Lennel Churchyard, Coldstream. By autumn the rain had turned the ground into a glutinous quagmire making all movement very difficult as can be seen from the photographs.