Notes
The Roll lists his address as 9 St Leonard's Street. It inaccurately records his surname as "Thompson"; it was actually Thomson.
(Harry Thomson's birth was registered in Huntingdon District in 1888. On the 1891 census he living with his parents Walter and Emma in Chapel Street, Alconbury, which was given as Harry's place of birth. On the 1901 census he was living with his parents at 24 Bedford Street, Peterborough; he was still living at that address with his mother in 1911.
Harry Thomson's Army service file records that he was living at 24 Bedford Street in Peterborough when he enlisted on 2/3/1916. He was called up on 18/8/1917 and posted to the 26th Training Reserve Battalion. He transferred to the 2/1st Royal East Kent Yeomanry on 22/9/1917, and joined the 680th Agricultural Company of the Labour Corps in Melton, Suffolk on 8/11/1917, under regimental number 491071. The file records that he married Ethel Ada Hall in Peterborough on 29/9/1918 and moved to 9 St Leonard's Street.
Having served only in the UK [and therefore not entitled to any war medal], Harry's Army file records that on 8/2/1919 he was granted 28 days' furlough, prior to his demobilization which was due on 8/3/1919. During his furlough, he died on 16/2/1919. His death certificate listed his occupation as "Private, Labour Corps", and the cause of death as pneumonia/influenza. He was buried in Block 1 of Broadway Cemetery in Peterborough.
Due to an administrative oversight at the time he died, the War Graves Commission was not informed of his death in service, and therefore had no record of him on their Register. However, following a successful submission to them in October 2015, the Commission accepted him onto their WW1 casualty registers, and his grave is now officially a war grave. They now record that Private Harry Thomson, regimental number 491071, died aged 30 on 16/2/1919 while serving in 680 Agricultural Company of the Labour Corps. They record him as the son of Walter and Emma Thomson, and the husband of Ethel Ada Thomson of Peterborough, and that he is buried in grave 1.2.73 in Broadway Cemetery in Peterborough). JK