Thornton Lanchester

A Seaman, Thornton died on 22nd of September 1914 at the age of 37.

Thornton was born at Fersfield, Norfolk, in 1877, a son of Fergus and Lavinia Lanchester.

In his teens Thornton worked as an agricultural labourer at Kenninghall but by 1901 he was a fisherman. He married Gertrude Elizabeth Fairhead at Saint Margarets Church, Lowestoft, on 5 July 1903 and they lived at 15 Grove Road, Lowestoft.

Thornton's Royal Naval Reserve service sheet shows that he initially joined the R.N.R. in 1898, but his service was not continuous and he enrolled again in 1900 and, for the third time, on 21 April 1914. 

Thornton was called out for service at the start of the First World War and on 2 August 1914 joined H.M.S. Hogue. 

On 28 August 1914 H.M.S. Hogue was part of the British naval force at the Battle of Heligoland Bight, but took no active part in the battle. On 22 September H.M.S. Hogue, sailing with sister ships Aboukir and Cressy, were in the Broad Fourteens area of the North Sea when each ship was sunk by torpedoes from German submarine U-9. A total of 377 men, including Thornton, were killed in the loss of the Hogue.