Warrant Officer Class 2 Frank Albert Mells
Mells with his wife Edyth in 1917
Frank Albert Mells was born on 6 August 1896 at Ballymacateer, Lurgan, County Down, the second of five children of English-born parents, coachman Frank Albert Mells and his wife Eliza (née Sheen). His mother died when he was just nine years old, and later that year his father married widow Sarah Jane Dickson (née Trotter).
Mells enlisted in the North Irish Horse between 10 and 13 September 1914 (No.1206 – later Corps of Hussars No.71281). On 1 May 1915 he embarked for France with D Squadron, which at the time was serving as divisional cavalry to the 51st Division.
In May 1916 D Squadron came together with A and E Squadrons to form the 1st North Irish Horse Regiment, serving as corps cavalry to VII, XIX, then V Corps until February-March 1918, when the regiment was dismounted and converted to a cyclist unit, serving as corps cyclists to V Corps until the end of the war.
Mells remained with the regiment throughout the war, though how much time he spent in France and Belgium and how much at the Antrim depot is not known at present. On 3 July 1917 he married Edyth Anna Thornton at the Church of Ireland Parish Church in Lurgan.
On 20 July 1919 he was demobilised and transferred to Class Z, Army Reserve.
At some point after the war Mells moved to England, where he worked as a civil servant. By the time of the 1939 Register he was living with his wife and child at 101 Francklyn Gardens, Edgware, Middlesex. He died there on 29 May 1976.
Mells as a civil servant in 1925
Images sourced from Ancestry Public Member Trees: contributor 'Ruth Smithson21'.