McCrae's battalion of footballers honoured in France

STUART BATHGATE IN CONTALMAISON

MEMORIAL UNVEILED

THEY came from Canada and Craigroyston, from Easter Road and Eastern Europe, to this village in northern France yesterday. A crowd several hundred strong, they gathered to witness the unveiling of the cairn which commemorates the 16th Battalion of the Royal Scots.

An Edinburgh battalion, the 16th was raised in less than a fortnight by Sir George McCrae, thanks in part to the alacrity with which many Hearts players enlisted. The club were top of the league when war broke out in 1914, and could boast some of the best footballers playing the game anywhere. Four years later, there was barely a player left who had survived unscathed.

Contalmaison, just outside the quiet little town of Albert, was reached by McCrae’s force in July 1916 at the Battle of the Somme. Those who survived that carnage started to plan a memorial to their fallen comrades the year after the war; yesterday, at last, that memorial was unveiled.

The service, held at the cairn just outside Contalmaison’s church, was conducted by the Reverend Fiona Douglas, whose grandfather, Sergeant John Douglas, was in the 16th. The memorial was unveiled by two cousins, George McCrae and Kenneth Hall, both grandsons of Sir George. And wreaths were laid by the score - by the regiment, by the families of the men, by ordinary supporters.

George Foulkes, the Hearts chairman, and Alan Anderson, the former player, laid a wreath on behalf of the club. Steve Cardownie, the Depute Lord Provost of Edinburgh, laid one on behalf of the people of the city. Rhona Brankin, the MSP for Midlothian, was there to represent the Scottish Executive.

"From the people of Scotland in recognition of your sacrifice," her wreath read. There was also a wreath from Hibernian, whose supporters, in common with those of their city rivals, joined up in substantial numbers when McCrae raised the 16th.

Sergejus Fedotovas, a senior advisor to Vladimir Romanov, laid a wreath on behalf of the Lithuanian businessman who is poised to become the biggest shareholder in Hearts. It included a poem in Russian, written by Romanov himself, paying tribute to the men’s "inspiring heroism."

This was a simple, moving ceremony which attracted people from far and wide. Those who live within a stone’s throw of Gorgie were there, as were those, such as Ron and May Ross, whose home is now a continent away. The Rosses live in Toronto, but decided that distance was no object to their attendance. The 23rd Psalm was sung; the Last Post was played; there was a moment of silence.

Countless people, including the families of the men, the Royal Scots regiment, and the Hearts Great War Memorial Committee, contributed to the occasion, but the catalyst for it all was one individual.

Jack Alexander, the author of McCrae’s Battalion, was single-handedly responsible for rescuing this remarkable story from the brink of oblivion. For a dozen years, up to the publication in 2003 of his book, Alexander laboured ceaselessly to piece together the tale.

A modest man, Alexander did his best to be self-effacing yesterday, staying in the background. Far more at ease with behind-the-scenes organisation, he spent much of Saturday night rushing from pub to pub in Albert - not because of a fondness for alcohol, but because he needed a stapler to affix the flags which were used to veil the plaques on the cairn.

Such painstaking attention to detail is also evident in McCrae’s Battalion. When he began his research, there was little extant evidence of the 16th - letters they had written or other details about their lives. Now, there may well be more accumulated infor- mation about them than about any other unit of the British Army.

Almost all of the relevant artefacts have been in Alexander’s house at one point, including the battalion’s colour which flew at the Somme. Yesterday, Major-General Mark Strudwick, the Colonel of the Royal Scots, paid tribute to its return, and to the men who bore it into battle.

"Eighty-five years on, the colour of the 16th is here at this memorial," Strudwick said, going on to celebrate what made the battalion special. "The depth of their comradeship came from the sportsmen, of Heart of Midlothian and other football teams. Their esprit de corps was second to none."

That esprit de corps, at long last, has a fitting memorial - one which, once he had embarked on the project, Alexander was convinced would be there one day.

"I’d always believed the memorial would be built," the author said. "Once I managed to get the story published there was never any doubt about that. The only doubt was the timing - without the help of so many people things like planning permission would have taken a lot longer."

Uncannily, as we left Contalmaison, two clouds in a patch of blue sky formed the unmistakable pattern of a saltire. Incredible? No more so than the story of McCrae’s remarkable battalion.

Taken from the Scotsman