HLI Chronicle 1915 - The Royal Highland Fusiliers

HIGHLAND LIGHT INFAN'l'RY.ICHRO~ICLE.
. H.L.I.
COl\fFORTS DEPOT.
Grand Hotel, Glasgow.·
A DEPOT for comforts for the men· of the
1st and 10th Battalions H.L.I. has been open •
in the Grand Hotel, Glasgow, since September.
The conveners are Mrs. James Lilburn and
Mrs. W. J. Anderson, and the committee
consists of Mrs. Robert Anderson, Miss Anderson,
Mrs. David Johnston, MIss Cowan, Mrs.
J. C. Camp bell, and Mrs. W. Lilburn, and they
have been assisted during the winter by Miss
J ohnston, ::\liss Foulis, and ~Iiss M'Lean.
This committee has worked in co-operation
with Miss Ronaldson in London and Mrs.
J. C. Grahame at Aldershot, who also collected
comforts. The following articles have been
collected at the Grand Hotel and distributed:
5,800 pairs socks, 1,516 shirts, 562 helmets,
1,196 body belts, 3,025 mittens and cuffs
750 sweaters, 765 mufflers, 65 blankets:
220 pants, 200 vests, 750 pipes. In addition
to this, large quantities of sweets, tobacco,
handkerchiefs, toilet requisites, etc., were
received. Also bandages, nightshirts, and
nightingales for the wounded.
In April the committee got the list of the
prisoners of war of the 1st Battalion, and they
at once appealed for food for them. The
response from the public was splendid, and
in a few days they had sufficient supplies of
tinned meat, cocoa, OKO, cakes, etc., to start
the parcels. Every man got a parcel containing
a shirt, pair of socks, muffler, handkerchief,
insect powder, soap, tinned meat,
cocoa, syrup, bread or biscuits or cake, and
cigarettes. Since then the whole of the 133
men have been "adopted" by different
ladies, who are sending, each to her own man,
a fortnightly parcel of food.
The committee continues to collect comforts.
and will be g:fat~ful for further supplies.
HEROIC H.L.I. SIGNALLERS.
SMART TELEPHONE ERECTION WORK.
A NON-COM:1rfIaSIONED officer of the Highland
Light Infantry, writing to his people in Galashiels
giving a description of some of the recent
fighting, relates how his company, the line
in front having been broken, charged through
this line and into a German trench, knocking
the enemy over by the dozen. "At daylight," he
says, " what a sight met our eyes !-Germans
lying round us in hundreds, and our own
fellows too, both wounded and dead. The
Germans were holding a trench about 15Q
yards to our front, and the ground between
the trenches was covered with dead, mostly
Germans. I think some of these dead men
were able to fire a rifle. About 11 a.m. the
Gurkhas romped into the German trench,
and the latter came out in scores and surrendered,
throwing their arms and equipmenu
away in their hurry to get· over to us away
from the Gurkhas. Terrible little men they
are with their ' ham knives.'
"In the evening two of our companies
advanced across the open and took part of
the German trench. It was during that advance
I witnessed the best show of the day.
It was the attempt made by our signallers
to get a telephone line up with the firing line.
Immediately the firing line passed us off went
a signaller with a reel of wire and the instruments
for the telephone. He was shot before
he had gone 20 yards. Seeing this, another
signaller leapt over the parapet, took the stuff
from the first, but he, too, was shot about
20 yards from cover. Then off went two more ,
and they were successful, and had a wir~
laid and the telephone working wi.thin ten
minutes after the place had been captured."
-Edfnburgh Evening Di:;patch, 5th April,
1915.