WW1 and the Scots

....After the Battle of Loos Scotland would never
 again provide half the number of infantrymen
for a massed attack on the Western Front, but
 there were to be two other battles in which
Scots played a leading role and suffered a
disproportionate number of casualties.

The first of these was the Somme in 1916,
 in which three wholly Scottish divisions took
part as well as Scottish battalions serving in
other divisions. (During the course of the battle
between July and November a total of  fifty-one
 Scottish infantry battalions took part in the
fighting on the Somme sector, but they were
 never in the front line at the same  time.) The
 second was Arras, in 1917, which saw the
 deployment of forty—four Scottish battalions
 on the first day plus seven Scottish-named
Canadian battalions, making it the largest
concentration of  Scots ever to have fought together.

 The novelist John Buchan estimated that the Scots’
 presence at Arras was seven times greater
than the army that fought under Robert the
Bruce at Bannock-bum in  1314,and it was
 larger than the total number which had fought
at Loos...

(from 'The flowers of the forest' by Trevor Royce)





Scotfamtree has access to all available
World War One Medal cards,Pensions,
 service records and many Newspaper reports.