18 March

Lonsdale Battalion events that took place on 18 March.
For events that took place elsewhere, see our sister project The Great War On This Day

1915 (Thursday)

Letter from Brigadier Collings to Lt-Col. Machell: “Your men are accommodated in huts and the Racecourse building. Please let me know how many in each, and if the accommodation is sufficient for your requirements, also terms you hold the buildings on that is tied or free & when hiring terminates. I see your depot remains at the Racecourse on the battalion proceeding to a training centre. If congestion is the reason you could I suppose easily camp out a company.^[1]
Copy of Lt-Col. Machell’s reply: “One company is located in the various rooms of the Grandstand, one in the stables, which have been specially adapted, and two Companies are in hutments which have been constructed for the purpose. The Camp is situated at a distance of 2 miles from Carlisle. We have no telephone.^[1]
Letter from B.L. Montgomery to Lt-Col. Machell: “I was talking to General Caunter at Command Headquarters today on the telephone and he said that from now on we were to consider you as belonging to our 112th Brigade.^[2]
Battalion Orders: The attention of all ranks ... is called to the urgent necessity of keeping all gates on the racecourse closed, in order to avoid damage to the cattle and sheep of the grazing tenant.^[3]
“The new Khaki Uniforms will be taken into wear for walking out and otherwise when specially ordered and the clothing of each NCO and soldier is passed.^[4]
F. Bradshaw (19440) enlists into E Company.^[5]

Rouvroy: The enemy continues to retire followed by the French.
The Division moves forward, two Brigades in front and one in Reserve.
The Lonsdales move to the old German front line south of Fouquescourt. Time spent in working on roads and bridging trenches to allow artillery and transport to pass. Then at 3.30pm they move to Hattencourt and remains there.
Deaths: Sydney Coppinger (28282 Pte.) / Steadman Newton (30173 Pte.)

Battalion situated in the line. All is quiet except for trench mortars 'Egypt Ho' and machine gun fire on tracks during the night.
A Company and D Company hold outpost line from area near 'Turenne Crossing' and 'Colombo Ho'.
C Company stays in support whilst B Company remains in reserve. Each post is held by 1 NCO and 6 men.
No movement during the day; wiring and working during the night. Hot food carried up twice nightly to all posts by B Company.

Notes

References

Acknowledgements

Various sources contemporary to the war have been used to compile The Lonsdale Battalion On This Day. The majority of the events shown on this day (18 March), including any supplementary notes, enlistments and statistical data etc., have been primarily sourced from the Lonsdale Battalion War Diary (November 1915 to June 1918), Record of the XIth (Service) Battalion (Lonsdale) and abridged material from Timeline and Chronology of the Lonsdale Battalion (September 1914 - May 1915), which are sourced from the original DLONS/L/13/13 Lowther Estate Archives. Events from that chronology are reproduced here with kind permission of Jim Lowther (2016). They are identified and referenced separately by their unique DLONS numbers. Please do not publish these events without prior permission from the Lowther Estate. All casualty names, numbers, ranks, date of deaths and places of burial/commemoration have been sourced from Soldiers Died in the Great War 1914-19, Volume 39, The Border Regiment and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission database respectively.