25 January

Lonsdale Battalion events that took place on 25 January.
For events that took place elsewhere, see our sister project The Great War On This Day

1915 (Monday)

Letter from Lt-Col. P. W Machell: "Having obtained the loan of a few service rifles and a small quantity of ammunition, I wish to put each Company through a modified course of musketry as it completes its practice with the Miniature rifle. There is a range at Burgh by Sands,....which in normal times belongs to the Territorial Force, but has now been taken over by the War Office. I have permission from the T.F.A. to make use of their target requisites." ^[1]
E. Storey (15472) and F. Gardner (16343) of C Company are discharged on medical grounds.^[2]
J. Fisher (13332) of A Company and G.A. Boyes (15339) of C Company are appointed the rank of Lance Corporal.^[2]

Battalion is situated in the F1 sector near Aveluy.
Allied artillery bombards the "Mound" with good results. One man is wounded.^[a]
Lt-Col. P. W Machell writes tribute letter to Mrs McQuire, son of Private McQuire:
"Dear Madam, I write from the trenches to beg you to accept the assurance of my deepest sympathy in your sorrow. Your son was greatly liked, and his death is regretted by the whole Battalion. He was not willing to accept promotion, but he was a natural leader, always cheerful, and carrying others with him in his desire to do his best all the time, and he did lead, without perhaps knowing it himself. I hope it may be some little consolation to know how much we all valued your boy, and how deeply his death is felt by us all." ^[3]

↑ The wounded man caused harm by self-infliction. No name is recorded in the war diary.

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 (25 January), 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.