Frank Beck (British Army officer)

Captain Frank Reginald Beck, MVO (3 May 1861 – 12 August 1915) was a land agent to the British royal family. He helped to form a volunteer company comprising members of the royal staff. Under his leadership this unit fought in the Gallipoli campaign of 1915. During a battle there Beck and many of his men went missing, presumed killed.

Born in Oxwick, Norfolk, he was the son of Edmund Beck, land agent to the British royal family at Sandringham. Educated at Norfolk County School, North Elmham, he inherited his father's position on the King's estate, serving as Land Agent at Sandringham to Edward VII when Prince of Wales, 1891–1901, and when King, 1901–10; and to King George V from 1910 until the war. He was appointed a Member of the Royal Victorian Order (4th Class) in 1901 and created a Knight of the Order of St Olav by the King of Norway in 1906.

Beck was instrumental in the formation of the Sandringham Company of Volunteers ("E" Company, 5th Battalion Norfolk Regiment, Territorial Force), which included grooms, gardeners, farm labourers and household staff from the King's estates. Beck raised the company as a Volunteer Force unit in 1906.

Despite his age and the fact King George V told him not to go, he volunteered for foreign service after the outbreak of war and served with the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force at Gallipoli, leading his company during the attack on Anafarta on 12 August 1915. He fought alongside his two nephews, Arthur Evelyn and Albert Edward Alexander Beck, who were both awarded the Military Cross. On that day, a large part of the Norfolks, including Capt. Beck and many of the Sandringham men, were missing in action. For several years, nothing was known of their fate, and a legend grew up that the battalion had vanished into a mysterious cloud.

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