Major
Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...
William Frank Thompson (17 August 1920 – 10 June 1944) was a British
officer
An officer is a person who has a position of authority in a hierarchical organization. The term derives from Old French ''oficier'' "officer, official" (early 14c., Modern French ''officier''), from Medieval Latin ''officiarius'' "an officer," fro ...
who acted as a
liaison
Liaison means communication between two or more groups, or co-operation or working together.
Liaison or liaisons may refer to:
General usage
* Affair, an unfaithful sexual relationship
* Collaboration
* Co-operation
Arts and entertainment
* Li ...
between the
British Army
The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...
and the
Bulgarian communist partisans during the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
.
Early life, family, and education
Thompson was born in
Darjeeling
Darjeeling (, , ) is a town and municipality in the northernmost region of the Indian state of West Bengal. Located in the Eastern Himalayas, it has an average elevation of . To the west of Darjeeling lies the easternmost province of Nepal, ...
,
Bengal Presidency
The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William and later Bengal Province, was a subdivision of the British Empire in India. At the height of its territorial jurisdiction, it covered large parts of what is now South Asia and ...
,
British India
The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one ...
to a British missionary family. He was educated at
Winchester College
Winchester College is a public school (fee-charging independent day and boarding school) in Winchester, Hampshire, England. It was founded by William of Wykeham in 1382 and has existed in its present location ever since. It is the oldest of the ...
and
New College, Oxford
New College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1379 by William of Wykeham in conjunction with Winchester College as its feeder school, New College is one of the oldest colleges at th ...
.
Freeman Dyson
Freeman John Dyson (15 December 1923 – 28 February 2020) was an English-American theoretical physicist and mathematician known for his works in quantum field theory, astrophysics, random matrices, mathematical formulation of quantum m ...
, a fellow pupil at Winchester, has described Thompson's extraordinary facility with diverse languages and that "Frank was the largest, the loudest, the most uninhibited and the most brilliant." Dyson "learned from him more than I learned from anybody else at the school".
His younger brother,
E.P. Thompson
Edward Palmer Thompson (3 February 1924 – 28 August 1993) was an English historian, writer, socialist and peace campaigner. He is best known today for his historical work on the radical movements in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, in ...
, was an English historian, socialist and peace campaigner.
Second World War
In 1939, while studying at the
University of Oxford
, mottoeng = The Lord is my light
, established =
, endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019)
, budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20)
, chancellor ...
, he became a member of the
Communist Party of Great Britain
The Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) was the largest communist organisation in Britain and was founded in 1920 through a merger of several smaller Marxist groups. Many miners joined the CPGB in the 1926 general strike. In 1930, the CPG ...
under the influence of his close friend
Iris Murdoch
Dame Jean Iris Murdoch ( ; 15 July 1919 – 8 February 1999) was an Irish and British novelist and philosopher. Murdoch is best known for her novels about good and evil, sexual relationships, morality, and the power of the unconscious. Her fi ...
. Despite his affiliation, he did not support the party's policy of neutrality dictated by the
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and joined the
British Army
The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...
with service number 124039 as a volunteer training with the No. 122 Officer Cadet Training Regiment before being commissioned
Second Lieutenant
Second lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer military rank in many armed forces, comparable to NATO OF-1 rank.
Australia
The rank of second lieutenant existed in the military forces of the Australian colonies and Australian Army until ...
into the
Royal Artillery
The Royal Regiment of Artillery, commonly referred to as the Royal Artillery (RA) and colloquially known as "The Gunners", is one of two regiments that make up the artillery arm of the British Army. The Royal Regiment of Artillery comprises t ...
on 2 March 1940.
He served in England, North Africa, Syria, Iraq, Sicily, Serbia and Bulgaria. He was part of the
Special Operations Executive
The Special Operations Executive (SOE) was a secret British World War II organisation. It was officially formed on 22 July 1940 under Minister of Economic Warfare Hugh Dalton, from the amalgamation of three existing secret organisations. Its pu ...
.
On 25 January 1944, along with three other
commandos
Royal Marines from 40 Commando on patrol in the Sangin">40_Commando.html" ;"title="Royal Marines from 40 Commando">Royal Marines from 40 Commando on patrol in the Sangin area of Afghanistan are pictured
A commando is a combatant, or operativ ...
, Major Thompson was sent on a
parachute
A parachute is a device used to slow the motion of an object through an atmosphere by creating drag or, in a ram-air parachute, aerodynamic lift. A major application is to support people, for recreation or as a safety device for aviators, who ...
landing mission to establish a link between the British staff and the Bulgarian partisans led by ; he landed near
Dobro Pole
Dobro Pole or Dóbro Pólie ( mk, Добро Поле), ( sr, Добро Поље, translit=Dobro Polje), ( gr, Ντόμπρο Πόλε, translit=Ntómpro Póle) is a peak situated on the Greece, Greek–North Macedonia, North Macedonian border.
...
,
Macedonia. The commandos carried a radio to keep in contact with the staff in
Cairo
Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...
,
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...
and
Bari
Bari ( , ; nap, label= Barese, Bare ; lat, Barium) is the capital city of the Metropolitan City of Bari and of the Apulia region, on the Adriatic Sea, southern Italy. It is the second most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy a ...
,
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
, but it broke down. On 23 May, Thompson took part in the clash at the village of
Batulia between the
Bulgarian Gendarmerie
The Bulgarian Gendarmerie' (Жандармерия – ''Zhandarmeriya'') is part of the Bulgarian Ministry of Internal Affairs or "MIA". (Bulgarian: ''"Министерство на вътрешните работи"'' or "МВР", pronounced '' ...
and the Second
Sofia
Sofia ( ; bg, София, Sofiya, ) is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain in the western parts of the country. The city is built west of the Iskar river, and ha ...
Brigade of National Liberation of the partisans. He was wounded by the gendarmerie forces, captured and, after a defiant speech in Bulgarian at his show trial, was
executed by firing squad
Execution by firing squad, in the past sometimes called fusillading (from the French ''fusil'', rifle), is a method of capital punishment, particularly common in the military and in times of war. Some reasons for its use are that firearms are us ...
in the nearby village of
Litakovo.
After the war and the establishment of a Communist government in Bulgaria, the nearby villages of Livage, Lipata, Tsarevi Stragi, Malak Babul, Babul and Zavoya were merged and renamed to
Thompson
Thompson may refer to:
People
* Thompson (surname)
* Thompson M. Scoon (1888–1953), New York politician
Places Australia
*Thompson Beach, South Australia, a locality
Bulgaria
* Thompson, Bulgaria, a village in Sofia Province
Canada
* ...
(''Томпсън'') in the British officer's honour. Similarly, the railway station at Prokopnik, the site of a fierce battle, became "Major Thompson Station".
E.P. Thompson wrote two books about his brother, the first with his mother, ''There is a Spirit in Europe: A Memoir of Frank Thompson''. The second, ''Beyond the Frontier: the Politics of a Failed Mission, Bulgaria 1944'', appeared in 1996.
[Rattenbury, A., 1997. Convenient Death of a Hero. Review of ''Beyond the Frontier: the Politics of a Failed Mission, Bulgaria 1944'' by Thompson, E. P. ''London Review of Books'' nlinevol. 19 no. 9 pp. 12–13. Available from http://www.lrb.co.uk/v19/n09/arnold-rattenbury/convenient-death-of-a-hero etrieved 2 March 2011][''Beyond the Frontier: the Politics of a Failed Mission, Bulgaria 1944'' by E. P. Thompson. Merlin/Stanford, 120 pp, £12.95, December 1996, ]
Honours
Thompson Hill in
Antarctica
Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest contine ...
is named after Frank Thompson.
References
;Footnotes
;Bibliography
*
*
CWGC entry* Stowers Johnson, ''Agents extraordinary'',
Further reading
*
*
*
*
Kristen R. Ghodsee
Kristen Rogheh Ghodsee (born April 26, 1970) is an American ethnographer and Professor of Russian and East European Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. She is primarily known for her ethnographic work on post-Communist Bulgaria as well as ...
,
Who was Frank Thompson" ''Vagabond Magazine'', No. 85, November 2013.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thompson, Frank
People executed by Bulgaria by firing squad
British people executed abroad
British World War II prisoners of war
British Special Operations Executive personnel
British Army personnel killed in World War II
Royal Artillery officers
Linguists from the United Kingdom
People educated at Winchester College
Alumni of New College, Oxford
Communist Party of Great Britain members
People from Darjeeling
1920 births
1944 deaths
Indian people executed abroad
20th-century executions by Bulgaria
20th-century linguists
Military personnel of British India
Special Operations Executive personnel killed in World War II