Hubert "Sheeny" Frank Tost
Bert was critically injured, and later died, during training on the Isle of Wight in the run up to the Dieppe Raid. He received a gunshot wound to the head while on the firing range. He subsequently died on the operating table at Parkhurst Military Hospital at 1645 hrs 15 June 1942. A full inquest was held and it was found that “Cpl Edward Boles while traveling through the range turned and fired at what he thought was a tin can target. The bullet passed through the trees and hit Platoon Sgt Tost in the head above his right eye and lodged in his brain”. According to his medical record it caused “extensive laceration and destruction of the brain”. Cpl Boles by his own account was good friends with Sgt Tost. The rifle used in the accidental shooting was Sgt Tost’s own issued rifle as he had lent it to Cpl Boles so that he could complete the course.
According to newspaper reports Sgt Tost “was among the first Georgetown men to go overseas. He had enlisted as a private and had proved to be a good soldier, first promoted to corporal, later to sergeant after his arrival overseas. He was the first Georgetown native to pay the supreme sacrifice of giving his life for his country.”
Bert was the son of William (deceased 1930) and Florence Lee of Georgetown…he had four sisters and two brothers, one of whom also served (Cyril WW2). Bert was a popular athlete, one of the mainstays of the Georgetown Intermediate hockey team and while overseas he was still keenly interested in local sports following the progress of his team in the Herald. Bert attended Georgetown High School, and he stated that he was a truck driver prior to enlisting with the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry in 1939 and was Anglican. The 1931 Canadian Census shows Hubert working as an electrician in a papermill and records the family living on John St., Georgetown. The 1935 Voters List pins the location down to “east of the creek and north of the CNR”.
Hubert was buried in Brookwood Military Cemetery in England. He is memorialized on the Georgetown Cenotaph in Remembrance Park, at Georgetown High School.
Truly a Canadian Hero. His story lives on.
Information taken from Veterans.gc.ca, Royal Hamilton Light Infantry Heritage Museum Facebook and Ancestry.ca
