Captain Frank Woolfe Haldinstein, Royal Engineers

Lieutenant Colonel (Retired) Edward De Santis, MSCE, P.E., MinstRE
(October 2023)

Figure 1. Captain Frank Woolfe Haldinstein, R.E.
(Image courtesy of the Imperial War Museum)

Captain
FRANK WOOLFE HALDINSTEIN
8^th Signal Company, Royal Engineers
Who died on 7 March 1917, Age 22
Son of Alfred and Edith Haldenstein of Thorpe Lodge, Norwich

2. FAMILY INFORMATION AND EARLY LIFE

Frank Woolfe Haldinstein was born in the third Quarter of 1894 in Norwich, Norfolk. He was the son of Alfred Isaac Haldinstein, JP (1850-1919) and Edith Rebecca Haldinstein, née Emanuel (1864-1940). Alfred Haldinstein was a well-known member of the Jewish community in Norwich. He was the wealthy owner of a Norwich shoe and leather company and President of the Norwich Jewish congregation.

Frank Haldinstein was educated at Norwich Grammar School and in 1912 he entered Christ Church College, Oxford University. While at Oxford he edited Oxford Prayers, a prayer book printed for the use of the Oxford University Hebrew Congregation. He was a deeply religious man with an ardent love for his religion and his people. He conducted Sunday afternoon religion classes for the children in the Jewish section of Norwich and prior to enlisting in the Army in 1914 to serve in the Great War he was a social worker helping Jewish boys and young men in East London.[1]

The Oxford University Roll of Service indicates that Haldinstein served in the ranks before being commissioned in the Royal Engineers. His Medal Index Card shows that he had been a Private, Regimental Number 2705, in the Royal Fusiliers prior to being commissioned in the R.E. No information has been uncovered during this research project to determine in which battalion of the regiment he might have served.[2]

Haldinstein was commissioned a 2^nd Lieutenant in the 2^nd London Divisional Engineers Signal Company, Royal Engineers on 21 May 1915.[3] There is some confusion regarding which company he actually served in. The 47^th Division was designated the 2^nd London Division and its signal company was the 47^th Divisional Signal Company. The London Gazette entry announcing his commission read exactly as follows:

The 2nd London Division was designated the 47th Division in 1915, during the Great War, and was referred to as the "1/2^nd London Division" after the raising of the second-line 60^th (2/2nd London) Division. The division was sent to France in March 1915, one of the first Territorial divisions to enter the fighting, and served on the Western Front for the duration of the war.[4]

One may assume that since he was to serve in the Signal Company of the 2^nd London Division and that this division ultimately was known as the 47^th (2^nd South London) Division, that this was the Signal Company referred to in the London Gazette. However, where the confusion arises is the fact that in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) records he is listed as having served in the 8^th Signal Company, which may also be the 8^th Divisional Signal Company.

For the purposes of this research the author has considered that Captain Haldinstein served in the 8^th Divisional Signal Company, putting more faith in the records of the CWGC than in other sources. See Annex A for the organization of a Divisional Signal Company.

The other units of the Royal Engineers serving in the 8^th Division at the time were the 2^nd Field Company, the 15^th Field Company and the 1/1^st (Home Counties) Field Company which later was renamed the 490^th Field Company. The division’s Pioneer Battalions which performed field engineering work when not engaged as infantry were the 1/5^th Battalion, the Black Watch (joined the division in October 1915 and left in January 1916) and the 22^nd Battalion, the Durham Light Infantry (joined in July 1916).[5]

The Battle of Neuve Chappelle, 10 to 13 March 1915, was the first action in which Haldinstein’s company was engaged. The 8^th Division was part of the British IV Corps during this battle. The Allied attack was intended to cause a rupture in the German lines, which would then be exploited with a rush to the Aubers Ridge and possibly Lille. A French assault at Vimy Ridge on the Artois plateau was also planned to threaten the road, rail and canal junctions at La Bassée from the south as the British attacked from the north. The British attackers broke through German defences in a salient at the village of Neuve-Chapelle but the success could not be exploited. The 8^th Divisional Signal Company did not suffer any fatalities during this battle.

The Battle of Aubers Ridge took place on 9 May 1915 and was part of the British contribution to the Second Battle of Artois, a Franco-British offensive intended to exploit the German diversion of troops to the Eastern Front. The French Tenth Army was to attack the German 6th Army north of Arras and capture Vimy Ridge, preparatory to an advance on Cambrai and Douai. The British First Army, on the left (northern) flank of the Tenth Army, was to attack on the same day and widen the gap in the German defences expected to be made by the Tenth Army and to fix German troops north of La Bassée Canal.

The attack was an unmitigated disaster on the part of the British. No ground was gained, no tactical advantage was gained, and they suffered more than ten times the number of casualties as the Germans. The 8^th Divisional Signal Company lost one man killed in this battle, 28739 Corporal Edwin Henry Cross.[8]

The Battle of the Somme also known as the Somme offensive, took place between 1 July and 13 November 1916 on both sides of the upper reaches of the river Somme in France. The battle was intended to hasten a victory for the Allies. More than three million men fought in the battle, of whom one million were either wounded or killed.

On the first day of the battle the German 2nd Army suffered a serious defeat opposite the French Sixth Army, from Foucaucourt-en-Santerre south of the Somme to Maricourt on the north bank and by the Fourth Army from Maricourt to the vicinity of the Albert–Bapaume road. The 57,470 casualties suffered by the British, including 19,240 killed, were the worst in the history of the British Army. Most of the British casualties were suffered on the front between the Albert–Bapaume road and Gommecourt to the north, which was the area where the principal German defensive effort was made.

The 8^th Division took part in the battle as part of the British III Corps and was involved with the attack on Ovillers. Despite the very large number of casualties suffered by the British, the 8^th Divisional Signal Company lost only one man, 53140 Sapper David Gedge.[10]

During the period from 21 October 1916 to 18 November 1916 the 8^th Division took part in operations in the Gueudecourt area during the latter stages of the Battle of the Somme. The 8^th Divisional Signal Company suffered heavy losses during this period with four men killed in action. Three of the men were lost on 25 October and one on 30 October.[11]

Early in March 1917 the Germans began the retreat to the Hindenburg Line. The 8^th Division, as part of XV Corps, began to advance against the retreating Germans. On 7 March 1917 Captain Haldinstein[12] was killed at Bray sur Somme while trying to assist a brother officer who had been wounded.

Frank Woolfe Haldinstein was 22 years old when he was killed. He was buried in the Bray Military Cemetery, Plot II, Row D, Grave 40.

The total number of fatal casualties suffered by the 8^th Divisional Signal Company is provided in Annex B below.

Captain Haldinstein’s Medal Index Card (M.I.C.) shows that he entered the theater of war on 7 September 1916 and therefore he would not have been eligible to receive the 1914-15 Star. He did, however, qualify for the British War Medal and Victory Medal.

Figure 4. The Medal Index Card of Captain Frank Woolfe Haldinstein, R.E.
(Image compliments of Ancestry.com)

Figure 5. The British War Medal and Victory Medal.
(Image from the author’s collection)

NOTE: The medals shown above are not the medals of Captain Haldinstein. The image is provided here for illustrative purposes only.

On the back of the M.I.C. is a note indicating that one Captain R.C. Linton Cronbach had made application on behalf of Mrs. A. Haldinstein for her son’s 1914-15 Star. This application was made on 24 March 1919. A reply was sent to Captain Cronbach on 15 April 1919 indicating that Captain Haldinstein was not eligible to receive the medal for the reason indicated above. Mrs. Haldinstein must have assumed that since her son had enlisted in the Royal Fusiliers in 1914 or 1915, and since he was commissioned in the Royal Engineers in 1915, that he was eligible for the 1914-15 Star. She was not aware of the requirement for the man to have entered the theater of war prior to 1916 to be eligible for the medal. Apparently, neither was Captain Cronbach.

Mrs. Haldinstein did receive her sons British War Medal and Victory Medal on 16 August 1921. She also received a Memorial Plaque to commemorate his service. This plaque was cast in solid bronze for each man who died while on active service during the war. Captain Haldinstein’s name would have been cast in the rectangle just above the lion’s head.

Figure 6. The Memorial Plaque.
(Image courtesy of the author’s collection)

Chaplain S. Lipson, a Jewish Army Chaplain who knew Frank Haldinstein, had this to say about him:

The loss the community has sustained in these fateful days is tragically exemplified in the late Capt. Frank Haldinstein, whose charm of personality was such that none could know him, even-for a-short-time, without being drawn to him by some indefinable magnetic influencer, which exercised an all encircling power for good. To us all be typified the best in the sons of the Empire whose alertness and high intelligence were, at the outbreak of hostilities, placed at the service of his King and Country. Uplifted by the unflinching resolve to maintain the highest level of duty, be gave all the gifts with which he was so richly endowed to that service, and in the supreme sacrifice which bereaves Judaism of a loyal son and his country of a great-hearted Englishman, his life will remain illumined by the light of noble and sweet memories which for all privileged to know him shall remain imperishable. By those who in this titanic struggle of the nations have gone down into the depths of silence, not dark, but depths from which shine forth a brightness which shill irradiate the path of duty for generations to come, there has been revealed even by those whose circumstances of life were the product of peace and not of war, bow that the great age of the ancients has become renewed and that in acting a true man's part man becomes a hero. And of those who played an heroic part, Frank Haldinstein takes for all time a foremost place. Ability matched by simplicity, force of character side by side with tenderness, the officer environed by a soldier's strong determination, allied to sympathetic with the peaceful pursuits of the student engaged in many fields of research and interests, the keen social worker bent on uplifting the lot of those whose lives were cast in surroundings less happy than his: he, though young in years, at an age when others are being led, was himself a leader and charged the atmosphere in which he worked with so much of noble stimulus that be became the centre from which emanated purposes of lofty living for those who came under his influence, which was sunk deep down in many hearts. Those who saw him deny growing from boyhood in all the accomplishments of an ideal manhood will realise how difficult any utterance is to appraise him at his real worth. Qualities of heart and mind combined in a singular degree of excellence were his and a gaping void, irremediable, floods the consciousness with the magnitude of the loss. Loyal to his heritage, giving homage to the gnawers of his history's pain, seeking to be in all places an ennobling force, he was the worthy descendant of his Jewish forbears who led the van in the world’s progress. Young in years, he already had accomplished much, and though the sun of his life has set on the field of honour it will rise again in the power of his example as a worthy son, a true-beamed friend, a champion of the poor, staunch always to the best. Herein let his loved ones who mourn find consolation in sorrow for the early close of his beautiful life, a life that revealed itself as an expression of beneficence, affection, and sweetness in all that he was called upon to do.

Figure 7. Captain Frank Woolfe Haldinstein, R.E.
Shown as a Lieutenant in this Photograph.
(Image courtesy of the Imperial War Museum)

In 1914, a divisional signal company consisted of a headquarters and four sections. No. 1 Section was made up of three cable detachments, each possessing 10 miles of cable and capable of establishing three telegraph offices (‘base’, ‘intermediate’ and ‘travelling’), as well as the staff which manned the divisional signal office. Also possessing four mounted orderlies, eight cyclists and nine motorcycle despatch riders, No. 1 Section had the primary responsibility of establishing communications between divisional and brigade headquarters, and between neighboring divisions. Sections 2, 3 and 4 were each allocated to the infantry brigades, charged principally with connecting brigade and battalion headquarters to one another, and each comprising 1 officer and 26 other ranks. In all, the divisional signal company totaled 5 officers and 170 other ranks.

By 1918, this number had expanded to 15 officers and 400 other ranks. In the process, a fourth cable detachment had been added in 1915 for the purpose of laying artillery communications, before the headquarters of the Royal Artillery Signal Section and the field brigade artillery sub-sections were absorbed in early 1917. Finally, in 1918, No. 5 (Machine Gun) Section was added, which consisted of 1 officer and 20 other ranks drawn largely from the Machine Gun Corps, and the personnel within the divisional signal company headquarters increased from 1 officer and 44 men in 1914 to 3 officers and 173 men in 1918.

Figures 8 & 9. A Motorcycle Despatch Rider and a Sapper in a Divisional Signal Company and a with Signals Armbands.
(Image from the author’s collection)

CRAIG, E.S. (ed.) Oxford University Roll of Service. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1920, p. 357.

Battle Honours of the Royal Engineers. The Royal Engineers Journal. The Institution of Royal Engineers, Chatham, Kent, 1925-1932.

[1] Oxford Jewish Community web site.

[2] The Royal Fusiliers had 47 battalions for service during the Great War of 1914-1918.

[3] London Gazette 27 May 1915.

[4] The Long, Long Trail: 47^th Division.

[5] The Long, Long Trail: 8^th Division.

[6] Wikipedia.

[7] Wikipedia.

[8] Commonwealth War Graves Commission.

[9] Wikipedia.

[10] Commonwealth War Graves Commission.

[11] Ibid.

[12] The dates of his promotions to Lieutenant and Captain were not uncovered during this research. Searches for notices of these promotions were made in the London Gazette, but the dates were not found.

[13] Commonwealth War Graves Commission.

Fatal Casualties of the 8th Signal Company, Royal Engineers in the Great War[13]

Surname	Forename	Initials		Date of Death	Rank	Reg. No.
PAYNE		A	MM	1/12/1917	Lance Corporal	32767
PETT	CYRIL ERNEST	C E		7/7/1918	Sapper	558031
FISHER	HENRY ARTHUR	H A		27/05/1918	Sapper	152339
EVANS		I	MM	29/03/1918	Pioneer	210782
SMITH	EDWARD	E		31/07/1917	Sapper	33997
JONES	JOHN HAYDN	J H		29/04/1915	Driver	25807
HALDINSTEIN	FRANK WOOLFE	F W		7/3/1917	Captain
JOHNSON	EDWIN HENRY CROSS	E H C		9/5/1915	Corporal	28739
PENWARDEN	LESLIE EDWIN	L E		3/7/1917	Sapper	148976
KEEBLE	ARTHUR THEODORE	A T		28/06/1917	Second Lieutenant
SOANES	ERNEST	E		31/07/1917	Sapper	32779
CHADWICK	JOHN	J		25/10/1916	Pioneer	33972
FOLEY		M J		25/10/1916	Sapper	34893
McDONALD	HENRY	H		27/05/1918	Pioneer	301952
ORMSBY	GEORGE	G		27/05/1918	Pioneer	210867
REYBURN	JOHN GILMOUR	J G		27/05/1918	Sapper	418459
GEDGE	DAVID ARTHUR	D A		1/7/1916	Sapper	53140
LAUDER	ALBERT ALEXANDER JOHN	A A J	MM	31/07/1917	Pioneer	222129
TELFORD	THOMAS	T		30/07/1917	Sapper	29507
DAVIES	ERNEST JOHN	E J	MM	16/08/1917	Serjeant	528536
HAMBLIN		G		3/12/1918	Driver	71653
ROWE	HUGH OWEN	H O		5/5/1918	Pioneer	82545
YOUREN	LEWIS	L		26/04/1918	Pioneer	316671
BONSER		R C		30/10/1916	Pioneer	28851
HOUSTON	LENNOX JAMES	L J	MM	16/08/1917	Pioneer	121265
BASTERFIELD		F C		17/02/1919	2nd Corporal	253691
STITTLE		E B		11/10/1918	Lance Corporal	72110
TRASK		W G		12/10/1918	Sapper	23116
CATLING		C T		12/6/1916	Sapper	15920
LEAPER		W		25/03/1917	Pioneer	32785
BRIDGE	THOMAS HENRY	T H		23/07/1917	Sapper	32777
FLYNN	JOHN COUTTS	J C		31/07/1917	Pioneer	172665
AKISTER	JOHN	J		27/05/1918	Pioneer	360848
O'CONNOR		D		27/10/1915	Corporal	30326
HILL	HAROLD TAYLOR	H T		12/10/1918	Pioneer	341414
HARRIS	ALBERT GEORGE	A G		25/10/1916	Sapper	70783
NISBET	EDWARD D. M.	E D M		12/10/1918	Pioneer	418499
HAYGARTH	RENNIE	R		27/05/1918	Sapper	253708
MacRAE	MATTHEW	M		18/02/1919	Driver	18267
SAUNDERS		W		30/10/1918	Sapper	230643