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Captain Clement Peter ARNOLD (129713)
7th Royal Tank Regiment, Royal Armoured Corps Date of birth: 23rd November 1914 Date of death: 20th June 1942 Killed in action aged 27 Buried at Tobruk War Cemetery Plot 10 Row D Grave 3
Clement Peter Arnold was born in Dorset on the 23rd of November 1914 the son of the Reverend Frederic Charles Arnold and Dorothy Kate Arnold of The Vicarage, Frisby-on-the-Wreake, Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire. He was christened at Broadstone in Dorset on the 10th of December 1914. He was educated at Lancing College where he was in Olds House from September 1928 to July 1932. He gained his School Certificate in 1931 and was a member of the Officer Training Corps where he achieved Certificate A in 1932. On the outbreak of war he enlisted in the Royal Tank Regiment in 1939 and was posted for training to the 102nd Officer Cadet Training Unit (2nd County of London Yeomanry (Westminster Dragoons) as Cadet 1889565. He was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Royal Tank Regiment on the 20th of April 1940 and was promoted to Lieutenant on the on the 20th of October 1941. He was posted to the 7th Royal Tank Regiment and went to North Africa where he contracted dysentery in 1941 and was evacuated to Alexandria. While he was there he met Lilian McCann of the Queen Alexandra's Imperial Medical Nursing Service and they were married on the 9th of February 1942. He was promoted to Acting Captain on the 5th of June 1942. In early June 1942 the 7th Royal Tank Regiment had fought a series of costly battles against Rommel's Afrika Corps and by the 18th of June they were inside the defensive perimeter at Tobruk. Part of the defences of Tobruk had been a minefield which had been lifted and moved to defend the Gazala Line so that when Rommel attacked with over one hundred tanks, on the 20th of June 1942, they were soon pouring through the gap. The 7th Royal Tank Regiment was sent forward to counterattack and after an engagement, which lasted eight hours, they had ceased to exist as a cohesive formation. Clement Arnold was killed in the final stand at the Bardia-El Adem crossroads. All of the officers and men of the regiment were either killed or wounded during the fighting. The British garrison at Tobruk surrendered at dawn the following day. After the war his wife was living with his parents at Frisby Vicarage. He is commemorated on the war memorial in St Thomas of Canterbury Church, Frisby-on-the-Wreake.

Olds House