Second Lieutenant Frank Robert Martin. George Medal
Personal Details
- 120736 Second Lieutenant
- Frank Robert Martin. George Medal
- 5 Bomb Disposal Company
- Royal Engineers
Son of Francis and Hannah Stephenson Martin: Husband of Kathleen Barbara Martin of Copthorne.
Died on 22 October 1940. Aged 29.
Buried at Cuckfield Cemetery, Sussex.
Plot 2 SE Grave 76.
George Medal Details.
On the 16th September 1940, a large unexploded bomb was reported at Lord Stanhope’s residence at Chevening. Lady Stanhope was at home and seriously ill, she could not be moved. Lieutenant F.R. Martin was detailed to attend this incident. Lieutenant Francis had recently lost four men on another incident and decided to tackle this one by himself, so others were not put at risk. After many hours of solitary digging, he reached the bomb at 04.00 hrs the next day. He extracted the fuse which was still ticking. He certainly saved Lady Stanhope’s life at great risk to himself. He was awarded the George Medal. Sadly five weeks later he died at another incident.
Photo taken by Pete Mason
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I can tell you a little more about Frank’s death. On the 22nd October, 1940 his team were called out to a large detached property called “Flaneswood” situated just off the A25 road on Seal Chart, near Stone Street, Sevenoaks. The property was owned by a Mrs Webb, who via the local Air Raid Wardens, had reported a large unexploded bomb in her garden. It was whilst trying to diffuse this bomb that Frank lost his life. I received this information from author Chris Ranstead when undertaking research for a book of my own. It was also substantiated by a gentleman I met in 2017, who had visited the property with his mother, in the days following the accident. As tea was being served in the snooker room, he remembers Mrs Webb being in tears over the death of the young officer.
The property is still there with the same name.
Hi Doug
Thank you for the information regarding Frank and apologizes for the delay in replying.
We’ve just updated his entry deleting the previous entry and replacing with the exact wording on the recommendation.
I will add your post as further information soon.
Regards
Pete
My parents bought the Flaneswood stable, now called Stonesthrow, in the early 1950’s and turned it into our family home and we lived there until the 1980’s. Not only is Flaneswood still there but so is the bomb crater just behind what was the gardeners cottage. I had no idea that such a brave young man lost his life.
There was a stick of bombs dropped by returning german bombers after a raid on London, I think, there is another crater at the bottom of the hill on Wildernesse Golf Course on the back road to Seal
We live in this property
Would be interested to hear any further background information regarding FLANESWOOD .
My father lived here with his grandmother ‘granny Elfie, mrs Webb and his cot was under a window that shattered in the explosion. Fortunately he wasn’t in it. I have a little more information, on my family who lived here. Would love to share, Ruth
Dr and Mrs Hay lived in Flaneswood for most of the time we were living in Stonesthrow, he was a radiologist and Mr and Mrs Pocock lived in the other half of Flaneswood.
It was a fantastic place to live and I have many happy memories