Frank Howard Kirby

Queen’s Own Oxfordshire Hussars 1889-1892
Royal Engineers 1892-1901
School of Military Engineering, Chatham 1902 – 1911
Royal Flying Corps 1912 – 1917
Royal Air Force 1918

Frank Kirby had a distinguished military career, serving in both the Boer War and WW1, for which he was awarded a Distinguished Conduct Medal and the Victoria Cross in October 1900. By the end of WW1 he had risen to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.He was made Colonel in 1926. He was also awarded a CBE in the same year.

Frank was born in Thame in Oxfordshire in 1871, the fourth son of William and Ada Kirby. By 1881 the family had moved to 224 Crystal Palace Road, Camberwell. Frank attended Alleyn’s between September 1882 and 1884, after which the family returned to Thame. Frank was one of the first pupils of the new Alleyn’s School, which had been reconstituted out of the Lower School of Alleyn’s College of God’s Gift. He attended school on the Old College site, but had left the School before it transferred to its new site at Townley Road.

After his military career he became a company director of Sika Ltd and died aged 84 in 1956.

Frank Kirby is honoured on several memorials and a good account of his life is given by Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Howard_Kirby.

In September 2021 Kirby was also honoured by Thame Town Council with a blue plaque, details of which are at www.oxonblueplaques.org.uk/plaques/kirby.html. To accompany the blue plaque ceremony an exhibition was held in Thame, and some images from that ceremony and exhibition are shown in the gallery images to the right. Some of the items displayed depict Kirby's heroic deed in the Boer War when he rescued a comrade from the battle field after that comrade had lost his horse.