It is the morning of 9th May, 1915, on the Rue du Bois, Aubers Ridge in Northern France. Under heavy fire, 27 year old Jimmy Sinclair, a Sapper in 23 Field Company, Royal Engineers, climbs out of the trenches with his party of infantry. With shells exploding everywhere and bullets flying all around him, what he does next will be announced, in front of all the officers and men on parade in Newark a few weeks later, as “remarkable”.
On that May morning, in spite of receiving injuries so severe that they require an immediate return to Blighty for the rest of the war, Sapper Jimmy Sinclair stays on in the attack, at great personal risk, to protect his fellow comrades, and continues with the work of clearing wire in No Man’s Land. For this action, he is recommended for the Distinguished Conduct Medal. His Field Company have been fighting in France since the first week of the war, and two of Jimmy’s fellow Sappers, McClean and Stander, are killed that day during the attack in which he displays such heroism.
Lest We Forget.
Published to coincide with Remembrance Weekend 2023, this tells the story of my great grandfather Jimmy Sinclair’s military service, with a particular focus on his time in France with the British Expeditionary Force at the start of World War One. For background information on Jimmy’s early years in Caithness and his adult life in Edinburgh please click the following link to read a blog summary published simultaneously with this piece: Jimmy Sinclair 1887-1964.
After leaving Caithness as a teenager, touring around the country as a painter and decorator, and starting to settle in Edinburgh, Jimmy enlisted in the Royal Engineers, at the age of 21, on 1st March 1909. After six months initial training in the skills of being a Sapper, his first posting was in September 1909 to 30 Company. They were based in Plymouth, and specialised in submarine mining and maintaining searchlights in ports. He spent a year with them before receiving the first of three overseas postings that he would have in his military career. Allocated to 43 Company, he set sail for the other side of the world – Mauritius, a small island in the southern Indian Ocean, off Madagascar and the East African coast.
Mauritius 13.10.1910 – 21.01.1912.
What a change for Jimmy this voyage must have been, let alone the destination. The island was small, sultry and probably not that welcoming. A British Officer, posted there at the same time as Jimmy, described the place thus:
We have all seen too much of each other, and these incessant tennis parties in the rain, the same dreary people, the same girls fishing for military alliances, the same bourgainvillias and oleanders are enough to drive one mad. There is something strangely unhealthy about this place. It is not that there is much illness. Since the draining of the marshes and other precautions there are few mosquitoes, and consequently next to no malaria, and the troops keep remarkably well, but there seems to be something downright decadent in the atmosphere of this hot, over-fertile island. The smallness of it, too, and its remoteness – it is some 9,000 miles from England ….. it is difficult not to deteriorate mentally in this atmosphere.
The island was a microcosm of the Empire. Originally a French colony, it had been taken over by the British a century earlier and many Indian workers had been brought in to work, especially in the sugar plantations. They, and the more native Creoles, were starting to seek a greater sense of equality with and independence from their colonial masters. Based in the reportedly luxurious, but isolated, colonial barracks of the Royal Engineers, the Sappers were kept busy developing the infra-structure of the island, such as building new bridges and railways, whilst maintaining a late imperial lifestyle of detached interactions with the local population.
Whilst Jimmy was there, a series of protests, which turned into the so-called Curepipe Riots, broke out across the island involving the Creole and Indian population, the latter led by an Indian barrister, Manilal Doctor, who had been sent to Mauritius by Gandhi to help secure workers’ rights against the British rule. The rioters mainly attacked business premises, initially in the town of Curepipe but then spreading into the capital, St Louis. At that stage, the local police could no longer keep control and the situation was handed over to the garrisoned troops. Luckily, all ended peacefully, with no weapons being used by the British soldiers.
Jimmy’s posting abroad ended on 21.1.1912. He would have undoubtedly been delighted to be back on home soil. it is possible that Mauritius and its riots were a foretaste for him of what he was to face nearly a decade later when he was serving in Egypt during its first revolution. But that was seven years after Mauritius. Before that, he first experienced a couple of years back in Britain, transferred to the Army Reserve. This must have allowed him a lot of time home in Edinburgh, probably also with some trips up to Caithness. Then his world, and indeed the entire world, was turned upside down, and nothing would ever be the same again.
France & Belgium 15.08.1914 – 15.05.1915.
The summer of 1914 saw Europe in crisis, after the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand. In a short period of time, that crisis accelerated to all-out war. By the beginning of August, Germany mobilised its army and commenced invasion of Belgium and Luxembourg. France then initiated hostilities, and Britain sent a final ultimatum demanding German withdrawal from Belgium. But that horse had already bolted, and Jimmy must have known what was coming. As war was declared on 4th August, he was mobilised. and directed to Aldershot, the headquarters of 1 Corps of the British Army, led by Lieutenant General Sir Douglas Haig. There, he was posted straight into 23 Field Company of the Royal Engineers.
For several years before the war, plans had been put in place to dispatch a British Expeditionary Force (BEF) to support France in the event of German military aggression. The main strength of the BEF in 1914 consisted of two Infantry Corps, each with a series of Infantry Divisions, comprising of Guards Brigades, Infantry Brigades, Artillery Brigades and Mounted Troops. Each Division also included two Field Companies of the Royal Engineers. 1 Corps, under Lieutenant General Sir Douglas Haig, included the 1st Infantry Division, containing battalions from many regiments, such as Jimmy’s fellow countrymen of the Black Watch and the Scots Guards. This 1st Division was the one to which 23 & 26 Field Companies of the Royal Engineers were attached. With Haig in command, the troops at Aldershot would have been under no illusion as to what was coming.
Following mobilisation, 23 Field Company spent eleven days planning their work for France. This included lectures, route marches, and preparation of equipment, horses and bicycles. The sense of anticipation must have been immense, be that due to excitement, fear, or a mix of both. On 15th August the Sappers of the 23 took the train from nearby Farnborough to Southampton, where they had to wait two days for an available ship. On the night of 17th August, they sailed on the SS Mellifont, across the Channel then up the River Seine to Rouen, and to war.
The 1st Division of the BEF was at the centre of much of the early British engagement with the Germans. Initially, they were actively involved in France during the retreats at the Battle of Mons in August, the successful attack in September of the First Battle of the Marne, and the stalemate that followed further Battles of the Marne and the Aisne. BEF operations then transferred to Belgium, in the so-called Race to the Sea, and the 1st Division, including Jimmy’s Field Company, were involved in a series of battles termed collectively as the First Battle of Ypres. Each side found their advances grinding to a halt, with trench warfare now being the dominant feature of the conflict. Winter operations continued in Belgium and then 23 Company returned to France, with long periods in early 1915 operating near Borre, Cambrin and then Le Touquet. By this time, the pattern had been set for the rest of the war: entrenchment, bombardment and slaughter.
Luckily for posterity, there is detailed information available on what happened to 23 Field Company from the moment of mobilisation onwards. This is due to the publication, in book form, by The Royal Engineers, of the entire handwritten wartime field diary of this particular Company. Jimmy himself is only mentioned once in the diary, but it gives a great insight into what he and his fellow Sappers got up to from day one.
Reading the actions undertaken by 23 Field Company in the first weeks and months of the conflict, the impression is of constant movement around the front line. Initially, they helped prepare positions for arriving troops, undertook demolition of roads and bridges to restrict enemy progress, started establishing forward observation posts, and set up numerous barbed wire defences. As the armies started to dig in, Sappers would often support the establishment of defensive breastworks for their infantry comrades, but unlike the infantry, they remained mobile, moving from one location to another. Whilst often dangerous, this must not have been as demoralising as the lot of those consigned to trench warfare.
For the Royal Engineers, even between the attritional battles, life was always busy. In one of the quieter periods of the first stages of the conflict, 23 Field Company’s diary for December 1914 includes the following duties
- Parade,
- Roadmaking,
- Digging trenches,
- Visit of H.M. the King,
- Digging trenches,
- Experimental work on trenches,
- Inspection by General Officer Commanding,
- Route March,
- Road mending,
- Use of rifle grenades,
- Making bombs,
- Digging new trenches,
- Bomb throwing,
- Pontoon bridge building,
- Laying mines,
- Placing wire,
- Draining trenches,
- Repelling attacks on trenches.
The Field Company Diary is full of detailed descriptions of incurring attacks or delivering actions of destruction, sometimes supported by illustrative diagrams of bridges either being blown up or built.
As a Lieutenant Colonel was to remark later in 1915:
They (the 23rd) were never happier unless they were patrolling No Man’s Land, sniping or arranging some special ‘hate’ in the form of trench mortaring or rifle-grenading. They also introduced the 8th Division to the Lewis Gun and we were greatly impressed with its usefulness.
Jimmy's Last Battle - Aubers Ridge 9.5.15.
In May 1915, Jimmy’s war changed forever. During the preceding months, both sides in the conflict had become fully entrenched, literally and metaphorically. A French offensive in March had failed at Neuve Chappelle, but the determination to break through German lines in northern France led to a plan for a joint French-British attack at nearby Aubers Ridge. The British 1st Division were to participate in this, and 23 Field Company spent weeks preparing the ground. Trenches were dug, breastwork was strengthened, streams and drainage ditches were bridged, and roads were improved. Meanwhile, some Sappers were digging tunnels right up to the German lines to plant mines.
The attack on Aubers Ridge was planned for early May, with Allied resolve strengthened by the Germans first mass use of poison gas in a battle at Ypres in late April. After days of bombardment, and delays caused by poor weather, 23 Field Company moved on 8th May 1915 up to the Rue du Bois, a crucial conduit for the assault to come. They bridged more streams and prepared for attack the next day.
In that 9th May battle, it is likely that the Sappers were ordered to operate at great risk in No Man’s Land, clearing mines and cutting barbed wire, whilst their infantry comrades, in their tens of thousands, were thrown out of their trenches to assault the enemy lines. At 5am, field guns and howitzers commenced a deafening attack. Half an hour later, the first British infantry climbed out of their trenches to charge, as did French counterparts further along the line. Waves of troops from the 1st Division were sent over the top all day long. In some places, soldiers were massacred the moment they showed their heads, with not one man of the Gurkhas or Seaforth Highlanders getting beyond their own parapet before being slaughtered. Few troops reached their goal of the German trenches, with many being stuck in No Man’s Land, failing to find paths through the barbed wire. One battalion of the Black Watch, sent over the top when the offensive was faltering, reached and breached the German lines, but within minutes, every single soldier in their attack was either dead or wounded.
In one of those positions, near the Rue du Bois, supporting the attack, was Jimmy Sinclair. He was seen leaving his trench alongside the infantry he was assisting, and took heavy fire. Shot down in No Man’s land, with men at risk all around him, he is described as continuing his work, clearing wire, whilst wounded, in order to save the lives of men alongside him and aid them in reaching the German lines on the ridge above them. This is what led to him being told on parade, by Adjutant Bond, in front of the Lieutenant Colonel Commanding, three months later back in England, that he was being recommended for the Distinguished Conduct Medal. By then, he had been sent home from the Front injured, to spend the rest of the war safe, training other troops. In being wounded whilst trying to save his fellow comrades’ lives, Jimmy probably saved his own.
11,000 British and Indian troops were casualties on 9th May at Aubers Ridge. The attack got nowhere.
The Diary of 23 Field Company merely states:
1st Division attack on Rue du Bois front. Attack failed and only work carried out was clearance of CINDER TRACK & EDWARD ROAD.
Next to this is a short entry:
Life after that battle must have been very different for Jimmy. Yet, in a letter to his wife, May Jane Maguire, in August 1915, he was as positive as ever, and looking forward to time with her at home in Edinburgh and also to visiting his mother, and sisters Jess and Minnie in Caithness. His initial return to Edinburgh though, must have been very hard, as a few days before Jimmy was badly wounded at Aubers Ridge, two of his Maguire brother-in laws had been killed: Hugh Maguire, who had enlisted in the Royal Scots when war broke out, in hand to hand fighting at Gallipoli; and Jim Maguire, a regular soldier like Jimmy, in the Scots Guards, shot by a sniper there at Aubers. Whether Jimmy found out about Jim’s death before 9th May, I do not know.
The rest of Jimmy’s war was spent training men to be sent to the Front, during which time he became a Non-Commissioned Officer. He probably had very mixed feelings about the work he was doing, as few would have wanted anyone to return to the slaughter he saw that day on 9th May.
Egypt 05.11.18 – 04.06.19.
There was to be one further posting overseas, to Egypt in 1918-19. Almost nothing is known of what happened to Jimmy there, and records seem less available for that time. It is likely that soldiers like him were sent out to North Africa, to support the Egyptian Expeditionary Force (EEF) at the end of the War, because younger and fitter conscripts were still required on the Western Front. When Jimmy was first there, war had been continuing against the Ottomans in Egypt, Palestine, Syria, the Sinai Desert, Jordan and the Lebanon. By 1918, enemy armies were being driven back, leaving Britain in control of large swathes of territory. However, within months, some areas under British control were seeking independence. In March 1919 part of the EEF was used to try to suppress the First Egyptian Revolution, a requirement that some soldiers opposed strongly. The country was turning against its colonial master, whilst the British government was seeking to exploit a large labour force to counteract the enormous debt arising from the war. This was a classic end of Empire posting, with revolution starting on the streets. Whether Jimmy was any part of that, will never be known.
What is known, is that Jimmy was by then in 569 Company of the Devon Royal Engineers. His Ministry of Defence War Record merely lists Egypt as his location at that time. He sent postcards home to his sons David and Tommy from Ismailia on the Suez Canal, which was both a place of work for some troops and also a place of rest and recuperation for the EEF. Engineers there at that time were certainly involved in strengthening lines of communication between Egypt and Palestine and building / maintaining railway links. Luckily, Jimmy only stayed there for seven months, returning home in June 1919.
End of Active Service
Jimmy stayed in the Army Reserve for another decade. In World War Two he took a prominent role in the local Civil Defence. From all the letters I inherited, and memories passed down, it is clear that was highly regarded throughout his career in the Royal Engineers. Rising through the ranks during WW1, he became a Company Sergeant Major by 1918. One letter I have, from the Chief Royal Engineer at the War Office, sent to Jimmy in 1939, describes how he had recently been discussed, in person, in a War Committee, as being exactly the sort of soldier they now needed to train officers to prepare for war against Nazi Germany. The meeting had been reflecting on lessons learned from the 1914-18 conflict, and the Chief Royal Engineer had stated that, in 1915 “a Sapper, Sinclair by name, had appeared at Newark and in a very short time was taking officer classes as if he had been an instructor for years.”
Jimmy’s recommendation for the Distinguished Conduct Medal was sadly never followed through. At that stage, too many troops across the Western Front were being put forward, understandably, for actions of exceptional bravery. From what I know of him, I doubt very much that he would want his life defined just by his military service, which he rarely spoke about in public. Yet I am equally sure that, humble hero though he was, he would not want the actions of his comrades in arms over the years to be forgotten.
Jimmy’s WW1 Medals were:
- 1914 Star
- British War Medal
- Victory Medal
Jimmy Sinclair & May Jane Maguire are buried together in Mount Vernon Cemetery, Edinburgh.
An absolutely fantastic and interesting piece of British history not only ‘told’ but able to be ‘easily read’. Thanks so much, Malcolm, for sharing this most interesting piece of wartime British history…with the rest of ‘your immediate’ and the Facebook families that you are so inexplicably linked to.