Frank Mason – South Wales Borderers, 4th Battalion

Private Frank Mason – South Wales Borderers, 4th Battalion

Early Life and Family Background

Thomas Mason and Alice Jane Morgan marriage certificate St. Mark’s Church, Fleur‑de‑Lis, Monmouthshire

Frank Mason was born in 1900 in Morriston, Swansea, the son of Thomas Mason and Alice Jane Morgan, who had married in 1879 at St. Mark’s Church, Fleur‑de‑Lis, Monmouthshire.

1901 Census

The 1901 Census records the family living at 88 Pentremalwed Road, Llangyfelach, where Thomas, aged forty‑six and born in Herefordshire, worked as a gardener, and Alice Jane, aged forty‑one, managed the home. Their children present were Thomas, sixteen, employed as a behinder in the tin works; Emily, fourteen; Honor, twelve; and Frank, aged one, the youngest in the household.

1911 Census – A Growing Morriston Household

1911 Census

By 1911, the Mason family were living at 3 Stapleton Place, Morriston. Thomas, now fifty‑five, was employed as a domestic coachman, while Alice Jane, aged fifty‑one, continued her household duties. Their children present were Thomas, twenty‑six, working as a blacksmith; Honor, twenty‑two; and Frank, aged eleven, who was still attending school. Also living with them were their son‑in‑law Robert W. Robertson, aged thirty, his wife Emily, aged twenty‑four, and their children Clifford and Leonard, both aged four, and Gilbert, aged three, creating a busy multi‑generational home.

Military Service – South Wales Borderers

Frank Mason later enlisted as a Private in the South Wales Borderers, 4th Battalion, joining one of Wales’s most distinguished infantry regiments during the closing months of the First World War.

Frank Mason
St. Samlet's Churchyard, Llansamlet
credit - findagrave

Death and Burial, January 1919

Frank died on 1 January 1919, shortly after the Armistice, during a period when many soldiers continued to succumb to illness or the lingering effects of wartime service. He was buried at St. Samlet Churchyard, Llansamlet, where his grave stands among the earliest post‑war burials connected to the parish.