Robert Slack
- Family History
- Military History
- Extra Information
- Photographs
Robert was born in 1893 in Huthwaite and was the son of Robert a colliery locomotive engine driver and Sarah Slack nee Cockayne , his father Robert senior was born in 1853 at Staveley, Derbyshire, his mother Sarah was born in 1853 in Kirkby in Ashfield, they were married in 1875 in the Chesterfield Registration district , they had a large family of 10 children , sadly 3 of whom died in infancy prior to the 1911 census , their children were George b1876 Brackenfield, Elizabeth b1878, Renishaw, William b1881 Huthwaite, Joseph b1884 Huthwaite , Robert b1893 Huthwaite and Ada b1895 Huthwaite. They lived at Mill Cottages Hill Side Huthwaite.
Robert enlisted in May 1916 at Derby, he gave his place of birth and residence as Huthwaite, he served at first with the service number 29515 in the South Staffordshire Regiment He was later transferred to the 7th battalion The Prince of Wales Volunteers ( South Lancashire Regiment) where he served with D company and became a marksman. During an advance on the 18th November 1916 he was reported as missing in action which was later officially acknowledged as killed in action on that date. His body was never recovered , he has no known grave, his name is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial on the Somme.
Notts Free Press 18th August 1916. Private R. Slack of the 3rd. Battalion, South Staffs., has been on a few days’ leave, and bore on his arm the crossed guns, which show the possessor of them to be a first class marksman. Private Slack states that he scored 134 out of a possible 170, which left him nine to spare over and above the qualifying total. His success is all the more meritorious because he has only been in the Army a short time. A Sutton man named Coupe got a higher place than him in the same test, and Private Bird, of Huthwaite, was only one short of the qualifying score. Private Slack is at Earsdon Camp, Northumberland, and out of 29 Notts and Derby natives who went in for the test only two failed. Mansfield Reporter and Sutton Times, 8 Feb 1917 HUTHWAITE SOLDIER MISSING A Huthwaite soldier, officially reported as “missing” is Private Robert Slack, 31389, D Company, 7th. Battalion Lancashire Regt. One of his friends has sent word to Private Slack's parents who live at 118, Windmill Cottages, that he took part in the “five mile push”, about the middle of November, as a bomb carrier, and that he saw him wounded in a shell-hole. Nothing has been seen or heard of him since, neither as a prisoner in Germany, nor through the medicl units, all efforts to trace him having proved unsuccessful. He wrote home last on the 12th. November. He joined up in May last and went to France in August. He was previously employed as a blacksmith at New Hucknall Colliery. He was 24 years of age.
