Mexborough & Swinton Times – Saturday 11 November 1939

Darfield Reservist

Private Thomas William Bowden, a popular Darfield youth, has been “somewhere abroad” since the end of September, and is anticipating a leave home at Christmas.

Bowden, who is in the Royal Artillery, joined up in 1930, and went as a reservist a few days before war was declared. At that time he was employed as a bricklayer and was working on the Royal Oak Hotel at Wombwell. His parents are both dead, and he resides with his sister, Mrs. N. Harley, Church Street, Darfield.

His little nine year old nephew, “Sonny” Harley, is tremendously interested in him and thinks he is a great hero, who will certainly end the war.

Private Bowden, in a letter to his sister, says the cigarettes out there are not his brand–nothing like as good as English, and complains of the incessant rain. Otherwise he is fit and happy and looking out for other Darfield lads.