Why we remember

Tomorrow is Friday 11th November – the 98th anniversary of the signing of the Armistice concluding the hostilities of the First World War. At 11am tomorrow morning, people all over the country will stop what they are doing to observe the anniversary in a moment of silent reflection. On Sunday 13th, Remembrance Sunday, services will be held nationwide to commemorate those who died in conflict, past and present.

Many of the Remembrance events that will take place over the weekend will be centred around the First World War, and in particular the Battle of the Somme which ran from 1st July to 18th November 1916. Of course, the fighting in 1916 was not confined exclusively to the Somme region, nor indeed to the Western Front. This letter from the museum collection reminds us that the First World War was indeed a global conflict, and reminds us of the loss and sacrifice that comes with War.

The letter was written to the mother of William Williamson, who was killed on 19th November 1916, by the officer commanding William’s company, Captain Frank Scougal. William was part of the 11th Scottish Rifles – a battalion of Kitchener’s Army serving at that time in Salonika, now part of Greece. In the letter, Captain Scougal explains that William died while trying to assist a friend, Sinclair, who had been badly wounded. Both men were killed by shellfire and were buried in Karasouli Military Cemetery.

Sadly, Frank Scougal did not survive the War; he was killed on 19th September 1918, just weeks before the signing of the Armistice. Tragically, Frank’s younger brother, Alec, had been killed the day before while serving on the Western Front. It is testament to the scale of the loss witnessed in the First World War that one short letter can come to represent the grief suffered by so many families.

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