21 December

Lonsdale Battalion events that took place on 21 December.
For events that took place elsewhere, see 21 December on The Great War wiki.

1914 (Monday)

Lewis Bell (17396 Pte.) enlists in Brampton, Cumberland.
Lt-Col. Machell to C Company: "The proportion of 20% of NCO’s & men proceeding on [Christmas] leave by train will in no case be exceeded...." ^[1]
Following War Office instructions fire screens to isolate burning huts were procured from Messrs. Laing & Sons, builders of Carlisle for £3 19s each.^[2]
Western Command: "Kindly note that the official title of your Battalion is 11th Border Regiment, and should be used in correspondence." ^[3]
Abraham Acton (10694) and James Alexander Smith (6423) of the 2nd Border Regiment^[a] are awarded the Victoria Cross for their actions on this day:
“For conspicuous bravery on 21 December at Rouges Bancs in voluntarily going from their trench and rescuing a wounded man who had been lying exposed against the enemy's trench for 75 hours, and on the same day again leaving their trench voluntarily under heavy fire, to bring into cover another wounded man. They were under fire for 60 minutes whilst conveying wounded men to safety.^[4]

Battalion situated at Puchevillers.
Some men involved in sniping and Lewis gun course; remainder parade for Battalion drill under Commanding Officer.
Afternoon spent in Company training.

↑ James Alexander Smith (6423) was attached to the 2nd Border Regiment at the time of the rescue of the two men. He was from the 3rd (reserve) Border Regiment.

Sources: Various sources contemporary to the war have been used to compile the Lonsdale Battalion on this day... (hover to read more)

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 (21 December), 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 Please do not publish these events without prior permission from the Lowther Estate.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.