Baroness Suttie
Main Page: Baroness Suttie (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, my great-grandfather, Alexander Suttie, like so many of his generation, did not like to talk about his experiences in the First World War. Indeed, one of the very few facts that we have been able to ascertain about his war experience is that his regiment trained at Stobs camp near Hawick in the Scottish Borders.
As schoolchildren, we used to explore the ruined army huts at Stobs camp and I used to often walk through the deserted camp on my way to climbing the hills around Hawick. I always found it a rather desolate place, perhaps remembering the tales that my father would tell of the place in the camp known as “suicide corner”, where several people took their lives, particularly German prisoners of war.
At its height during World War I, well over 10,000 troops were stationed there—mostly Scots but also troops from around the British Empire. Many thousands of German prisoners of war were held there and they helped to construct the huts and the sewerage system in the camp. There was even a German bakery, which provided bread for the soldiers.
In May 1916, one Scottish soldier based in Stobs camp wrote:
“We have 5,000 German prisoners here and they have a better time of it than us. They bake all our bread, carving an Iron Cross on it. Some of our boys don’t like it but to my taste it seems all right. We have about 15 thousand of our boys here and the bands’ playing all day make the place a bit lively”.
One week later, however, the same soldier remarked:
“It has rained ever since we came here, we are all fed up with the mud”.
Among the many Scottish troops who trained at Stobs camp were several battalions of the King’s Own Scottish Borderers, who then went on to take part in the Gallipoli campaign in the summer of 1915. Ten years ago, when I was working in the European Parliament, I went on an official visit to the Gallipoli peninsula organised by the Turkish Government with the Irish President of the European Parliament, Pat Cox. Pat Cox was very keen to pay his respects at the graves of the many Irish soldiers who lost their lives in Gallipoli. As we were leaving the British war memorial I spotted a large shield-shaped stone. It read:
“From the town of Hawick, Scotland. In grateful memory of the officers and men belonging to that town who fell in Gallipoli in the Great War, 1915”.
Although I was obviously deeply moved by the whole sombre mood of the windswept peninsula, it was not until I saw—quite unexpectedly—the name of my home town, Hawick, that I was able to understand just what an impact the deaths of so many men would have had on one small community back home. More than 50 men from Hawick died on 12 July 1915, and more than 100 local men in total died there.
In researching my remarks for this afternoon I came across a report on the events of 12 July at Gallipoli, written at the time, from the 4th Battalion of the King’s Own Scottish Borderers. I believe that it is worth quoting a couple of excerpts.
An account of the charge was written for the record by Captain—afterwards Major—W T Forrest, who was subsequently killed in Palestine. He wrote:
“It is with sadness one takes up the pen to put on record the deeds of the Battalion on and around the 12th of July, 1915, when so many good officers, N.C.O.’s, and men laid down their lives. However, it is their just due that these deeds should be put on record, so that future generations may know what Border men were able and willing to do in the interests of King and Country”.
Another officer of the battalion further recorded of events that day:
“The scenes outside the dressing stations in the Nullah ... were beyond description. Around each station were rows upon rows of stretchers—each containing what had been or, rather, what remained of a human being.
The slightly wounded were waiting in long queues for treatment. What impressed one was the absolute deathly silence which prevailed over each station—not a word or a groan to be heard. We could find none of our own men among these cases, which probably had all come in from the later attack of the 157th Brigade”.
Such was the scale of losses that day that every year there is a memorial service in Hawick, and in 1926 the shield that I saw in Gallipoli to the men of Hawick was installed under the names of the King’s Own Scottish Borderers’ missing and dead.
I was very pleased to hear from my noble friend the Minister that there will be an extensive schools programme as part of the commemorations. It is deeply appropriate that pupils from Hawick High School this year and next will have an opportunity to participate in a UK-wide project organised by the Gallipoli Association for 2015. But if my small home town of Hawick lost more than 100 men in Gallipoli, 34,000 died from across Great Britain and Ireland, and we must never forget the horrendous loss of life from the Anzacs: nearly 9,000 Australians and just under 3,000 New Zealanders died. More than 1,300 Indian soldiers lost their lives, including 371 from the Sikh 14th Regiment.
One hundred years on it is virtually unimaginable that we could ever return to trench warfare with our European partners. For all its imperfections, the European Union provides a very effective series of mechanisms for resolving difficulties and disputes between our countries.
The events of a hot June day in Sarajevo 100 years ago led to a series of events and human slaughter on a scale never witnessed before. I therefore believe that those who have queried whether we are right to carry out a series of commemorations to mark the start of the First World War across this country are mistaken. We are not glamorising war by remembering its true horror. It was a truly awful war on an unimaginable scale and I believe it is vital that the centenary is used to inform and remind both schoolchildren and adults of the tremendous sacrifices made by the many across our communities, including those from my small home town of Hawick, 100 years ago.