Some years before the outbreak of war,
a branch of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve was established at
Carr’s Flour Mill in Silloth. In the late summer of 1914, the whole
group were called up and posed for this picture. Theodore Carr is in
the centre; the lad, third from the left in the back row is Duncan
Chisholm. The names of five of the others are now inscribed on the
town’s war memorial in the grounds of Christ Church.
Salt water ran in Duncan Chisholm’s
veins; his father was captain of the Silloth steam tug ‘Petrel’.
Like the other lads, he probably joined the reserves out of a sense
of adventure and the promise of a free week’s holiday on a training
ship each year. He could never have expected that, within a few
months, he would be dressed in khaki and fighting in a bloody battle
over a thousand miles from home.
The Silloth men were not the only ones
to be called up. All over the country, reservists reported to naval
dockyards and bases. There were far more of them than the navy needed
and it had nowhere to accommodate them. At this point, Winston
Churchill came up with one of his very worst ideas; he decided to
place these surplus sailors under army command. They were to be known
as the Royal Naval Division.
Eight battalions were formed, all named
after famous naval commanders. Most of the Silloth reservists were
assigned to the Collingwood battalion. Training took place in the
south of England and was slow; the men were issued with old rifles
from navy stockpiles.
Turkey was then part of the Ottoman
Empire which had joined the war on the Germans’ side. When the
fighting in France and Flanders reached a stalemate, the allies
decided to open a new front with the idea of gaining control of the
Turkish shipping lanes. In February 1915, the Navy started an attack
in the Dardanelles. Landings by British, Australian and New Zealand
forces took place in April on the Gallipoli peninsular.
The allied troops dug in but came under
heavy attack from the Turkish artillery; very little territory was
secured. Reinforcements were required and the men of the Royal Naval
Division were to form part of these. The men were shipped out to
Egypt to prepare for landings in early June, 1915.
Before he embarked for the
Mediterranean, Duncan Chisholm must have been granted a few days
leave. He came home to Silloth and his family insisted that he posed
for a portrait in his new khaki uniform.
The far-away look in his
eyes has been captured perfectly by the photographer – Annie Gibb.
Annie was quite remarkable. At this time, it was very unusual for a
woman to be involved in photography and it was virtually unknown for
one to set up in business on their own account as she had.
The Collingwood battalion of the RND
came ashore at Sulva Bay on June 4th and advanced slowly
under heavy fire. Duncan was among them together with three of the
other Silloth lads – Edgar Sisson Swan, Sam Borthwick and Joe
Johnston.
Two were members of the Silloth Rugby
team; Borthwick played at half-back and Johnston was a three-quarter.
Swan had been a golfer. By the end of the day, Borthwick had been
wounded and Duncan and Joe were posted as ‘Missing’. Duncan must
have turned-up later but the other three all died from their
injuries.
The war memorial bears the name of two
other RND men: Gordon Brown and Petty Officer John Jefferson
Underwood who both died later in what became known as the third
battle of Krihia. The allies never gained control of the Gallipoli
peninsular and all their troops had been withdrawn by Christmas.
Duncan survived to fight another day.
In 1918, he was in action on the front line in France where he was
gassed in a German attack. He was brought back to England and spent
some time in hospital near Wigan. While he was there, his father died
suddenly, working on his allotment, but Duncan was too ill to attend
the funeral.
Another of the Silloth reservists who
survived the Gallipoli landings was Thomas Stanwix, a farmer’s son
from Blitterlees, just outside the town. Years later, his family
turned their farm into a holiday camp.
He made it through the early stages of
the Gallipoli landings but, in August 1915, suffered “severe,
multiple shell wounds in the forearm, nose and thigh”. He was taken
to hospital in Malta and, eventually, back to the Royal Naval
Hospital in Portland.
After recovering from his wounds, he
saw action on the western front and was again wounded in May 1918. He
was then promoted and became involved in the logistics of supplying
the front-line troops.
He was awarded the Distinguished
Conduct Medal but never talked much about his experiences. He used to
say that, when he returned home, he had to undress and bath in the
byre to get rid of the lice and mud before he went into the house.
After the war, Thomas Stanwix joined
the police and moved to the North-East. Duncan Chisholm became second
engineer on the S.S. ‘Asseroe’, which sailed regularly between
Silloth and Dublin. When this service was suspended, in 1940, he went
to work at Carr’s Mill.
They were lucky. Over 34,000 British
troops died during the ten months of the Gallipoli campaign; 78,500
were wounded. The Australian and New Zealand forces lost around
11,500 men with a further 24,000 badly injured. Total casualties for
the Turkish forces have been estimated at 175,000. The song ‘and
the band played Waltzing Matilda’ calls them the forgotten heroes
of a forgotten war. They won’t be forgotten in Silloth.
