Tommy Sinden Dies in Tasmania
Many older readers will remember Tom ‘Tommy’ Sinden who recently died
in Tasmania aged 83.
Tom Sinden, older brother of Francis Sinden of North Salts, was born
in Rye in 1922. He was educated in Rye and took up an apprenticeship
as a painter and decorator on leaving school at 14. The war came along
and prevented Tom from completing his apprenticeship. He joined the
Territorial Army as a bugler. In 1939, at the age of seventeen, he
was mobilised with many more local lads and went to war. He served
in many theatres of the war until demobilisation in 1946.
Tom did various jobs around Rye in the years after the war but decided
to emigrate on the Australian £10 scheme in 1955.
He lived and worked near Melbourne. On retiring he moved again, this
time to Tasmania, where he lived out his final years doing charity
work.