An article in the ‘Huddersfield Daily Examiner’ of 13 November 1993 identifies Frederick Charles Cooke and Thomas Deakin, as having been Constables in the Huddersfield Borough Police:

“[They] appear to have been mates at Huddersfield police station who joined [the Royal Field Artillery] together. They had consecutive service numbers….. and in September 1917 were both fighting in Flanders…. “[Frederick Charles Cooke] was raised in a Dr Barnado’s Home in London’s East End”…...”[Thomas Deakin] was Doncaster-born”.

And the following appeared in the ‘Huddersfield Daily Examiner’ of 14 November 1917:-

“Sergeant Frederick Charles Cooke (29), Royal Field Artillery, has died of wounds. He was formerly a Constable in the Huddersfield Borough Police Force, in which he had served five years. He had been in Canada for some time before returning to England, and joined the force in January 1912. He joined the army in April 1915, and has served at the front for nearly two years. His widow and one child live at 84 Lightcliffe Road, Crossland Moor [Huddersfield].”

His Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) entry confirms that L/25421 Serjeant Frederick [Charles] Cooke of ‘C’ Battery 161st Brigade Royal Field Artillery was the: “husband of Mrs. E. Cooke, of 5, Lingan St., Great Church St., Hammersmith, London”

In 1912 in the Huddersfield Registration District, Frederick Charles Cooke married Eliza nee Paice (born in the Fulham (London) Registration District 1889). And Frederick and Eliza would have one child, Emily May Cooke (born Huddersfield 1913).

Frederick Charles Cooke’s service records have not survived. But the publication ‘Soldiers Died in the Great War 1914-1919’ shows that, when he enlisted in Huddersfield, he gave Huddersfield as his then place of residence. It also states that he died of wounds. Frederick’s medal card shows that he disembarked, headed for the Western Front, on 27 December 1915. It also records that he was awarded the 1914-15 Star, thus confirming that Fredrick first entered a war zone before 31 December 1915.

The CWGC relates that Frederick Charles Cooke died on 19 October 1917 (when he would have been aged 29) and that his remains are interred in Minty Farm Cemetery, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium. It may be relevant that Frederick met his fate at the time of the Third Battle of Ypres, also known as the Battle of Passchendaele, which ran from 31 July to 10 November 1917.

The 1921 census found Eliza Cooke, Frederick’s widow, and their daughter, Emily May Cooke, residing in the home of Eliza’s widowed mother, Sarah Ann Paice (born Shifnal, Shropshire 1858) at 5 Lurgan Street, Hammersmith, London. And Eliza was now employed in the Metropolitan Police’s Women Patrols. [“the Metropolitan Police Women Patrols were formed in 1919, led by Superintendent Sofia Stanley. This was the first time women were formally inducted into the Metropolitan Police.” (National Archives)]