Frank Heilgers

Lieutenant-Colonel Frank Frederick Alexander Heilgers (25 June 1892 – 16 January 1944)[1] was a British Conservative Party Member of Parliament (MP) who was killed in a train crash during World War II.

Heilgers was from Bardwell in Suffolk and was educated at Magdalen College, Oxford.

He fought in World War I in Gallipoli, Egypt and Palestine,[2] earning a Mentioned in Despatches.[3]

He was elected as MP for Bury St Edmunds at the 1931 general election.[4][5] Heilgers was Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of Agriculture from 1935 to 1936, to the Minister of Pensions from 1937 to 1940,[3][6] and the First Commissioner of Works in 1939–40.[7] He was awarded the Silver Medal of the RSPCA for promoting the passage of the Riding Establishment Act into Law, 1939.[3]

Heilgers was made a JP for the county of Suffolk in 1923, and was an Alderman of West Suffolk County Council.[7] He farmed over 1,000 acres in the county and was a breeder of British Friesian cattle and Large Black pigs.[2]

He was recalled to the army on the outbreak of World War II in 1939 and served on the staff at home as Deputy Assistant Quartermaster General to 11 Corps in 1940 and at the War Office in 1942.[7]

Heilgers, a Royal Artillery[3] officer, was killed, aged 51, in the 1944 Ilford rail crash[8] He was laid to rest in Bardwell churchyard.[3]

References
  1. Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "B" (part 6)
  2. Who Was Who 1941-1950. A and C Black. 1952. p. 525.
  3. CWGC entry
  4. Craig, F. W. S. (1983) [1969]. British parliamentary election results 1918–1949 (3rd ed.). Chichester: Parliamentary Research Services. p. 470. ISBN 0-900178-06-X.
  5. "No. 33769". The London Gazette. 6 November 1931. p. 7144.
  6. Hansard
  7. Kelly's Handbook to the Titled, Official and Landed Classes, 1944. Kelly's. p. 903.
  8. "Heilgers". Parliament website. Retrieved 9 August 2010.
Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by
Walter Guinness		 Member for Bury St Edmunds
1931 – 1944		 Succeeded by
Edgar Mayne Keatinge
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