Thomas Ernest Bax was born in Ramsgate, Kent, in the summer of 1914, the son of Thomas Ernest Bax and Edith Mary Hogben. He grew up in the parish of St Lawrence-in-Thanet and later lived at 37 Winstanley Crescent, Ramsgate, before the Second World War took him from the Kent coast to the Mediterranean theatre.
He married Joan May Woodland at St Lawrence, Ramsgate, on 4 December 1937. The couple had no children. By the time he died in Sicily on 9 August 1943, aged 29, he was serving as Gunner 806653 with the 17th Field Regiment, Royal Artillery, and had become one of the many young men from Thanet lost during the Allied campaign to capture the island. [1]
Thomas Bax left Ramsgate as a young husband and died of wounds in Sicily during the hard final stages of the island campaign.
Early Life and Family
Bax was born in Ramsgate, a port and seaside town whose identity had long been shaped by fishing, trade, tourism, and its position on the Kent coast. His birth was registered in the Thanet district in the June quarter of 1914, only weeks before the outbreak of the First World War.
In June 1921, when he was seven, he was living in St Lawrence Intra, Ramsgate, and was recorded as a grandson. The available record does not identify the household in detail, but it places his childhood firmly within the neighbourhood surrounding St Lawrence, an area closely connected with Ramsgate’s expanding residential population in the inter-war period.
By 1937 Bax was living at 37 Winstanley Crescent, Ramsgate. That year he married Joan May Woodland at St Lawrence, and their marriage was registered in the Thanet district. Their life together was brief and was lived against the growing uncertainty of late-1930s Britain, when Ramsgate itself was increasingly conscious of its exposed position near the continent.
Military Service
Thomas Bax served as Gunner 806653 in the Royal Artillery, with the 17th Field Regiment. A gunner was a fully trained artillery soldier responsible for operating, maintaining, supplying, and protecting the regiment’s guns. Field artillery units were built to provide mobile fire support to infantry formations, using their guns to strike enemy positions, suppress counter-attacks, destroy strongpoints, and cover troops as they advanced.
A British field regiment normally consisted of three batteries, each with eight guns, giving the regiment a substantial concentration of firepower. In the Sicily campaign, field artillery was most commonly equipped with the 25-pounder gun-howitzer, an adaptable weapon able to fire high-explosive, smoke, and other ammunition in support of rapidly moving ground operations. [2]
Gunners endured an especially demanding form of service. Although often positioned behind the foremost infantry, artillery units were exposed to shelling, air attack, counter-battery fire, and the hazards of moving guns and ammunition along poor roads. The work was physically exhausting: gun crews had to establish positions, calculate and execute fire missions, move forward as the line advanced, and keep weapons firing despite dust, heat, shortages, and enemy action.
Unit Context at Time of Death
In August 1943, the 17th Field Regiment was serving in Sicily with the British 78th Division during Operation Husky, the Allied invasion and conquest of the island. The invasion began on the night of 9–10 July 1943, when a vast Allied force landed to open a route into mainland Italy and to remove Sicily as an Axis base in the Mediterranean. [3]
By early August, the campaign had moved beyond the initial beachhead battles into difficult fighting across Sicily’s mountainous interior. The British advance faced determined German resistance, especially around the approaches to Mount Etna and the towns that controlled routes north towards Messina. The 78th Division was engaged in this demanding advance, with its artillery supporting infantry attacks and responding to German positions that often dominated the surrounding high ground.
The 17th Field Regiment’s guns formed part of the division’s artillery screen and offensive firepower. On 9 August, the divisional artillery came under heavy German shelling, and surviving contemporary research into the regiment’s war diary identifies a number of 17th Field Regiment casualties on that date, including Gunner Bax. This makes clear that the unit was not merely moving in support of the battle but was itself under direct and dangerous enemy fire. [1]
On 9 August 1943, the guns of the 17th Field Regiment were under heavy German shelling while supporting the advance through Sicily.
Circumstances of Death
Thomas Ernest Bax died of wounds in Sicily on 9 August 1943. The available record does not identify the exact gun position, battery, or immediate incident in which he was wounded. However, the concentration of 17th Field Regiment casualties on the same date, together with the report of heavy German shelling of divisional artillery, strongly places his death within the artillery battle during the advance through central and eastern Sicily. [1]
He was 29 years old. His death occurred less than a week before the end of the Sicilian campaign, which concluded on 17 August with the Axis evacuation from Messina. Yet for the men still fighting, the final advance was no less dangerous than the initial landings. Field regiments had to continue firing, relocating, and supplying their guns as the front moved through difficult country towards the north-east of the island.
Bax’s death was therefore part of the final cost of Operation Husky. The campaign succeeded strategically, opening the way for the Allied invasion of mainland Italy, but the success was achieved through sustained fighting in which artillery crews were frequently called upon to work in exposed positions close to the changing front line.
Burial and Commemoration
Thomas Bax was buried at Catania War Cemetery in Sicily, in grave II. K. 4. The cemetery contains Commonwealth burials from the Sicily campaign and later operations connected with the fighting in southern Italy. His burial in Sicily gives him a permanent resting place close to the campaign in which he died.
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission records him as Gunner Thomas Ernest Bax of the Royal Artillery, serving with the 17th Field Regiment, and gives 9 August 1943 as his date of death. His grave also stands among those of fellow artillerymen from the same regiment who died during the same phase of the campaign, reflecting the concentrated losses suffered under enemy shellfire. [1]
For Joan May Bax in Ramsgate, the cemetery in Sicily was necessarily a distant place of mourning. The couple had been married for fewer than six years and had no children, making the loss especially personal and final. His CWGC commemoration ensures that his name remains linked both to the war in Sicily and to the family and town he left behind in Kent.
Legacy
Thomas Ernest Bax’s life joined two very different places: the familiar streets of Ramsgate and the harsh mountains and gun positions of wartime Sicily. He was a young husband from Thanet whose service in the Royal Artillery placed him within the machinery of Allied combined operations in the Mediterranean.
His story also reminds us of the often-unseen contribution of field artillery. Infantry attacks, tanks, and aircraft are commonly remembered in accounts of Sicily, but their operations depended upon artillery units that delivered constant support while under threat themselves. Bax was one of the gunners who enabled that advance, and his death illustrates the risk borne by the crews behind the guns as well as by troops at the front.
Remembering him restores an individual life to the broad history of Operation Husky: a Ramsgate-born soldier, husband of Joan May Woodland, and gunner of the 17th Field Regiment, who died of wounds during the Allied advance in August 1943.
Sources and Further Reading
- Commonwealth War Graves Commission: Thomas Ernest Bax
- Catania War Cemetery | Commonwealth War Graves Commission
- 17th Field Regiment, Royal Artillery, Sicily, August 1943
- United States Army Center of Military History: Sicily, 9 July–17 August 1943
- Imperial War Museums: Sicilian Campaign film record
Sources
[1] 17th Field Regiment Royal Artillery – Sicily – August 1943 https://ww2talk.com/index.php?threads/17th-field-regiment-royal-artillery-sicily-august-1943.33038/
[2] Sicily 1943 https://mikesresearch.com/2023/08/06/sicily-1943/
[3] SICILY – U.S. Army Center of Military History https://history.army.mil/Portals/143/Images/Publications/Publication%20By%20Title%20Images/C%20Img/campaigns-wwii/pdf/35.pdf
[4] Individual-Report-for-Thomas-Ernest-Bax.pdf https://ppl-ai-file-upload.s3.amazonaws.com/web/direct-files/attachments/141549598/6179aa35-60af-47f9-acca-c9592158ea4c/Individual-Report-for-Thomas-Ernest-Bax.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=ASIA2F3EMEYER2UH5CCI&Signature=4A5uSBYsHxGFikDTg13UOXtNKgc%3D&x-amz-security-token=IQoJb3JpZ2luX2VjEIv%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2FwEaCXVzLWVhc3QtMSJIMEYCIQDHaSPoznrdrDLzPO4hfxALJmqdKcKTkxkDrhVW97HgOgIhAP2r7x%2F%2FVE0YNvP2%2Bg6sr%2Bb7bsmnwRyipy6Xdp2rz3CSKvMECFQQARoMNjk5NzUzMzA5NzA1IgwK2z3xXJqKGmE%2Fu7Aq0AQk1JHELPBgVPcp2VXzolLgYDY%2FLZyxrRL3kTOtKO47r%2BzCUzvY92sNFWhSUcNId1Ru66xTMY%2BfGRCZJdm%2FMM7ljh3JHrpjx1vNxas%2FVbeMaRRZjZ%2FSCoCcVfpf%2F%2FOuvnWOdq7OyDGHp0NuyeDNkOL5HsetbiApZdbYfoxWqeipL2mx53GWtxj28C%2Bw4U9n2rL03KOsNuMMhalbq8z1%2B6ued%2FvbmbAiG4crRaTMDf3bfDFNxV5TxJF4ry1%2BS4kkVItCFFbjrhRecxz1j%2FdnwfqiVjE%2F0930KWqBQ6t%2BbCHsSZ5sFYTAem2iE2wncNKgV7j0MZmNvHA%2Bf50rsNt8%2BHdqRk2tYNsdJHbIq0wzqX20ostSF8FxVPiRGMcKPeATxWCTpFu6Y9HyyUJwMZwWr4CE8A23q%2FJtgnNub9CEQNcfyw87GaVPCNuUwYA9XeVWnVsrlPTgAUF8DHhHa%2BJOc1D6JTLBMmZluWSZDmmJg72P44QeFb0G%2BiTxd9cJntlJLpLuPjzXzfij2TvZN5A632KU5vZUCyVpypePGr2lJWmXIzRA6yVZchpHogvPYLSjNbgWCPXcOelILbhUbEGvA1ugU9zL3w%2BWltLQ39Q8cK56w0dE4eO7x%2FKK5kelktBE3KW3KcJpgG3UTV%2F3uf1qXQ2myf1HPx%2F9K402tE8%2Fs2CORXuTlCuETqVD7vzjUWomFBkHsqjSVYftvkjZuhb5uLDBHqVkGzfE4x%2BkfztgwNKjfirVP5qDrfH5ibR2Su%2FY6ccqR7jevalmAV3L%2BbDHdpN1MKDz1tMGOpcB30grBi4ZT95HFX5Rq9dtOrDnIoPZcGz8CQY7L0Boakwf%2Fm75Yf5cjqB91gebJxHedyzVI%2F4td93fLPEV%2FNqVUv%2FbywS7GJX%2BTu78TZdevZaKatL5z4XjU%2FORJWG7fFdX6nmOxz9Lwr6cu6lo9FHfWYXrJMIKbXJ057xZd79DY%2F7VQy%2Facoi7YcdwFHRjjrPKdIiqoWOWYw%3D%3D&Expires=1786101599
[5] Possible photo of Royal Canadian Artillery soldier in Sicily … https://www.facebook.com/groups/141371489605093/posts/2325099824565571/
[6] Royal Artillery units in WWII, 181st Field Regiment RA history https://www.facebook.com/groups/553899301708247/posts/2033115707119925/
[7] Allied advance in Sicily, 1943 – London https://www.facebook.com/iwm.london/videos/allied-advance-in-sicily-1943/832395679719264/
[8] Account of Battles in Sicily Campaign from 128th Field Reg … https://51hd.co.uk/accounts/128_field_reg
[9] GPO War Heroes https://gpowarheroes.org.uk/
[10] Operation Husky order of battle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Husky_order_of_battle
[11] history of the royal regiment of artillery. … https://www.gutenberg.org/files/52258/52258-h/52258-h.htm
[12] The Guns of Sicily http://rca-arc.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/No02-The-Guns-of-Sicily-Maj-David-Grebstad-2nd-place.pdf
[13] SICILIAN CAMPAIGN [Allocated Title] – IWM Film https://film.iwmcollections.org.uk/r/479
[14] British Army Officers 1939-1945 — M https://www.unithistories.com/officers/Army_officers_M02.html
[15] WW2 People’s War – 111th Field Regiment, Royal Artillery https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/09/a2921609.shtml
[16] Personnel – 58th Brigade, Royal Field Artillery https://58fab.com/personnel/