9th-12th-Lancers - Year 2002 - Page 0082
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| Regiment | 9th/12th Lancers |
|---|---|
| Year | 2002 |
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80 REGIMENTAL JOURNAL OF THE 9TH/12TH ROYAL LANCERS (PRINCE OF WALES’S) saved her father’s life by throwing up his head and deflecting an Afghan bullet. Brigadier became his hunter, lived to a ripe old age and was buried at Anton’s Hill. The family still has his sil- ver-mounted hoof.“ Like many of his family James was an excellent horseman and was Master of the Northumberland and Berwickshire Hunt for 10 seasons, keeping hounds on his estate. Together with a friend, he took a forty year lease of the entire River Sand in Norway, including the netting at the mouth of the river, which they immediately closed down. Under their management the Sand became one of the finest Norwegian salmon rivers of its day. When they arrived in 1885 the average weight of fish was a mere 5 lbs. At the end of their lease in 1922 it had risen to near- ly 30 lbs- a prodigious achievement by any standards. James retained a family connection with the Ninth. Shortly after the Afghan War, Brevet-Major Bloomfield Gough as he then was, who had been his Squadron Leader, married his sister, Maria Jean, May to her family, whom he first met when he vis- ited James and his wife Jessie at Anton’s Hill. He commanded the Regiment from 1895 to 1899 when he was sacked, or stellen- bosched in Boer War jargon, by his divisional commander, Lord Methuen, during the march on the besieged city of Kimberley for reasons which appear to be totally unjustified. On a happier note, George Scott Watson, a Border farmer, who kept a hunting diary for over forty years, records that in November 1900 James and Colonel Gough, two distinguished Ninth Lancers, were among only four riders out with the Northumberland and Berwickshire who were present at the kill in the dusk at about 4.30 pm after a long hunt.6 James’s son Martin was commissioned into the Ninth in March 1915 when he was only 17, joining the regiment in France in February 1916. His letters and diary provide as vivid an account of the life ofa cavalry subaltern in World War One as his father’s letters had in the Afghan War forty years earlier. Sadly he was fatally wounded near Montauban in March 1918 in the fighting which followed Ludendorff’s breakthrough. To illustrate the terrible toll exacted from military families, nine of Sir Martin Hunter’s great-grandsons served in that war, six of whom, including Martin and all three of Colonel Gough’s sons, were killed.7 When World War One broke out, to his considerable chagrin, James Hunter, at 59, was too old for active service. He devoted himself to his war work as Vice-Convenor of the Berwickshire County Council and President of the local Red Cross. As the war went on, he was to head no less than 16 committees involved in various aspects of the war effort, served on the Agricultural Executive Committee and commanded the Guides, forerunners ofthe Home Guard in the Second War. His dedication was such that, although he had a petrol allowance, he would ride on horseback in all weathers to the County Council offices in Duns - a round trip of 18 miles.3 After James died in May 1924, still in harness as Convenor of the County Council, his daughter wrote eloquently of him: ‘His integrity and public spirit were an example to all and he was greatly respected by all the local people....The war years, cul- minating in the death of his only son, had taken their toll. He was never quite the same again although he never failed in his duty to his family and his country,’ 9 References l. Hy Wilson Memories of Anton’s Hill p.1. The title of Sir Martin Hunter’s appointment is taken from his and Lady Hunter’s Journal (Whitworth Edition) pp.l 21-22. 2. Hy Wilson p.l Your letter ofJune 20 2002. Hy Wilson pp. 1-2 Your letter ofJune 20 2002. George Scott Watson. Fox Hunting on the Borders 1896- 939 Revised Edition (2000) p.18. Hy Wilson p.21 Hy Wilson pp 17-18. Berwickshire News. James Hunter obituary May 27 1924 3. 4. 5. 6. l 7 8 The Stellenbosching of Colonel Bloomfield Gough by David Ramsay he Goughs with their remarkable record of providing a Field-Marshal, seven other Generals and three V.Cs in four generations were certainly the most distinguished of all the Anglo-Irish military families. Six Goughs fought in the Boer War and no less than ten in the First World War. The family originally hailed from Wiltshire but had settled in County Limerick early in the seventeenth century. Hugh Gough, Colonel Gough’s great-uncle, made a considerable reputation commanding the 87th Regiment in the Peninsular War. (The family’s coat of arms depicts the Regiment breaching the walls of the fortress during the Battle of Tarifa) He later became C-in- C in India in the 1840s, winning a number of decisive battles and adding the Punjab to the British Raj. These achievements earned him a Field-Marshal’s baton and a Viscountcy. The best-known member of the family was the Field-Marshal’s great-grand nephew, Hubert Gough (16th Lancers). Hubert, like other Gough soldiers, was apt to be too impetuous and con- troversy stuck to him throughout his military career. In March 1914, when he was commanding the 3rd Cavalry Brigade, sta- tioned outside Dublin, he became involved in the so-called Curragh mutiny. In the First World War, Hubert rose from Brigadier to full General commanding Fifth Army in two years. His stellar career came to a sudden end in March 1918 when he was sacked following Ludendorff’s breakthrough which was mainly directed against Fifth Army. Bloomfield Gough’s father, General SirJohn Bloomfield Gough, was a nephew of the Field-Marshal and had served as his Military Secretary in India. He was born in December 1851 and was commissioned in the Rifle Brigade in 1870, transferring into the Ninth Lancers at Colchester three years later Like his cousin Hubert, he was always known to his family and by his Regiment as Goughie. The Regiment moved to Sialkot in India in 1875 and Goughie, an excellent horseman, played in four Regimental polo teams, who won the Inter-Regimental Tournament between 1878 and 1885. He served with the Regiment throughout the Second Afghan War of 1879-1880 |
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