On this day, 100 years ago an IMechE member was killed in action.
FRANK TREVOR WILKINS: 3rd July
Graduate Member since 1913.
At the outbreak of war he was a Student at Birmingham University.
Wartime posting(s) was/were, 2nd Lieutenant, Northumberland Fusiliers, 15th Battalion, Border Regiment, attached to 1st Border regiment.
Killed in action, France.
1916 Obituary
Sec. Lieut. FRANK TREVOR WILKINS, 13th Northumberland Fusiliers, was born in Birmingham on 8th March 1890.
He was educated at King Edward VI School in his native city, and gained a Foundation Scholarship there in 1900.
On leaving school in 1906 he was apprenticed for five years in the marine-engine works of Messrs. Vickers, Ltd., Barrow-in-Furness, and during the greater part of this time he studied at the Barrow-in- Furness Technical School.
In 1909 he left Barrow to complete his apprenticeship at the University of Birmingham, and having taken his B.Sc. degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1912, he returned to Barrow for three months’ work in the drawing-office.
In October of the same year he obtained a Bowen Research Scholarship in Engineering at the University of Birmingham, where be took a M.Sc. degree in 1914. During the period he was at Birmingham he was a Member of the University Officers’ Training Corps, and soon after the outbreak of the war he received a Commission as Second Lieutenant in the 13th Northumberland Fusiliers, proceeding shortly afterwards to Egypt.
In 1916 he was transferred to France, being attached to the 1st Border Regiment, and took part in the great attack on 1st July, when he died from wounds received in action, at the age of twenty-six.
He had prepared a Paper on “Trials of a Diesel Engine,” which had been accepted by the Council for reading and discussion at a Meeting. This Paper was the outcome of experiments he had made at the University of Birmingham, and was presented at the Meeting in October by Professor F. W. Burstall, under whose supervision the trials had been made.
He was elected a Graduate of this Institution in 1913.
Institution First World War Honour Roll
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