Lieut Robert Quilter GILSON [1188]

  General Notes:

Robert Gilson was one of the many young men destined for greatness, whose lives of purpose, and promise, were cut short by the tragedy of WWI.

From a webpage posted on July 9, 2014. by librarysphinx publishing Robert's letters and images:
Gilson was admitted to Trinity College, Cambridge in 1912, a year behind fellow T.C.B.S.¹ member Thomas Kenneth ("Tea Cake") Barnsley, and read Classics. When the War broke out in 1914, he decided to finish his undergraduate degree and trained as an officer alongside his studies through the Cambridge University O.T.C. Upon graduating with a First Class degree in the Classics Tripos Part I, Gilson was commissioned as Second Lieutenant in the 11th Battalion Suffolk Regiment, known as the Cambridgeshires. The regiment deployed to France on 8 January, 1916.
At 7:30 AM on 1 July, 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme, Gilson led his men over the top near La Boisselle. The German guns, which were supposed to have been destroyed by a week of heavy bombardment by British artillery, were still working. When the Cambridgeshires advanced, the German gunners, shaken but still alive and alert, opened fire. A fellow soldier reported that Gilson walked calmly and steadily forward in front of his men, taking charge briefly after his commanding officers fell, until he himself was killed by a shell burst. On that first day of the Somme, Gilson was only one of 6,380 casualties from 34th Division, the division that sustained the heaviest casualties on the deadliest day of fighting in British Military history.
We have a window into Gilson's brief life thanks to his prolific and eloquent letters to his school friends, family and his sweetheart, Estelle King, written from his time at Trinity College through to his last days on the Western front.
1. Tea Club and Barrovian Society, named after the Barrow Stores at King Edward's, where the group often met.
Ref: http://trinitycollegelibrarycambridge.wordpress.com/2014/07/09/wwi-gilson/

John Garth
Tolkien Studies
Volume 8, 2011
pp. 67-96 | 10.1353/tks.2011.0008
In Tolkien and the Great War, I dealt closely with the T.C.B.S., the circle of former schoolfriends who encouraged and critiqued Tolkien's early mythological writings from 1914. Among them, Robert Quilter Gilson played two crucial roles. In life, he was the social hub of the group. His death in the Battle of the Somme was a crisis that helped to catalyze and mature Tolkien's sense of creative purpose.
Ref: http://muse.jhu.edu/login?auth=0&type=summary&url=/journals/tolkien_studies/v008/8.garth01.html

Gilson Robert Quilter of Canterbury House Marston Green near Birmingham Lt 11th battalion Suffolk Regiment died 1 July 1916 in action in France Probate Birmingham 13 October to Mary Dorothea Gilson spinster Effects L710 2s 9d
Ref: National Probate Calendar.

  Research Notes:

Image courtesy of Trinity College Cambridge.wordpress.com

  Other Records

1. Census: England, 31 Mar 1901, King Edwards School Headmasters House St Martin Birmingham. Robert is recorded as a son aged 7 born Harrow MDX

2. Census: England, 2 Apr 1911, Marston Green nr Birmingham. Robert Quilter is recorded as a son aged 17 unmarried a scholar born Harrow MDX