TOPIC:

Good Morning Everyone......

Bringing this over from the Victorian Wars Forum, hopping someone can help.......

For - t6ches

I have been searching the medal rolls and came across this unit, The English Composite Cyclist Company which originally comprised of five officers and 103 other ranks, all were volunteers from most of the English infantry volunteer battalions (and a few Welsh), a separate Scottish Cyclist Company existed. Has anyone any information on them?

I would be interested in anything that can be found......

Mike

Hey Mike, I just completed an e-mail to you and then opened this Topic. If you look up the SELKIRK TRIBUTE , you will note the one I once owned was to Sgt LINTON, who was in the Scottish C C. It's in HIBBARD but I don't recall if he said much about the CC.
I believe I did place/add to a thread on the Scottish CC.
Baden Powell

Cyclist John Kemp, also of Selkirk, received his medal and an inscribed watch, alongside Sergeant Linton and 16 other volunteers, in Selkirk market place, on Saturday 27th September 1902. [Southern Reporter, 2.10.1902]

Hi Mike, I have a 5 Bar QSA to 8369 W. H. Cox Composite Cyclist Battalion (Ex 2 VB Manchester Regiment) along with his 1915 Trio 2 CAN INF. Regards Bob

I am just transcribing the names from the Bromley And District Volunteers - South African War memorial onto IWM WMR #44061

There are five members of the Composite Regiment of Volunteer Cyclists. All survived and none have military ranks.

The picture on the WMR is very poor quality but I found a newspaper report in The Bromley Telegraph and Chislehurst Chronicle, 9th November 1901 with a list of the names on it.

Globe - Thursday 16 May 1901
CYCLISTS FOR THE FRONT
Orders have been issued for the Composite Company of Volunteer Cyclists, 150 strong, which has been formed at Aldershot to embark in the transport Canada at Southampton on the 23rd inst. for passage to South Africa. Capt. Wardle, Ist V.B. North Staffordshire Regiment, goes out in command, the other officers being Capt, W. B. Robinson, 2nd V.B. Derbyshire Regiment, and Second Lieut. E. D. Dickson, 2nd V.B. Cheshire Regiment.

Maidenhead Advertiser - Wednesday 08 July 1903
THE VOLUNTEERS.
PRESENTATIONS AND INSPECTION.
The G Company and Cyclists of the Ist Vol. Batt. Royal Berks Regiment were paraded outside the Armoury on June 24th, when Colonel O. P. Serocold made the following presentations. Cyclist H. Moore was handed a South African medal and five bars. It may be remembered that Moons served with the Composite Cyclist Company, and it is said that he has more bars than any other man in the Royal Berks Regiment. Colr.-Sergt. T. West and Cyclist W. Gilder next received the long-service medal, and then the prizes .....

For anybody who is still interested in the Composite Cyclists:

I am currently studying the men from Volunteer Companies in the Black Country and slightly beyond who served in the ABW as part of the Volunteer Service Companies (VSC) attached to the South Staffordshire Regiment.

One of my main sources of reference is a self-published book by Jeffrey Elson entitled “The South Staffordshire Regiment South Africa 1899-1902 (The Second Boer War)”. On page 118, amongst the local volunteers listed as serving in the 2nd VSC, are 10 men attributed to the “Cyclist Company” as below. Those with given name(s) fully stated are the ones for which I have found attestation papers/service records. Where known their age, height, weight & occupation at time of attestation are given in brackets:

7106 Private John Brittain (20 yrs, 5ft 7in, 137lbs, Brown Saddler)
7107 Private George Everiss (24 yrs, 5ft 6½in, 140lbs, Brass Dresser)
7108 Private A York(e)
7109 Private Randolph Charles (20yrs, 5ft 4½in, 147lbs, Clerk)
7110 Private E Merriman
7111 Private Alfred Tew (23yrs, 5ft 6in, 120lbs, Mechanic)
7112 Private John Roper (20yrs, 5ft 3½in, 123lbs, Cycle Maker)
7113 Private Francis Henry Walmsley (21yrs, 5ft 6in, 126, Drapers Assistant)
7114 Private A Butler
7115 Private Robert Harry Perks (21yrs, 5ft 5½in, 133lbs, Clerk)

It would appear those above 24 years of age need not have applied but an article appealing for applicants when the Company was formed gave an acceptable age range of 20-35, so my small sample appears misleading. Also only Brittain was above average height at the time – cycles as an individual form of transport were seen as creating a smaller target than a horse so were smaller men perceived to enhance this effect? Were Tew and Roper successful candidates because of their apparent ability to repair the bicycles when they went wrong. Based on physique hill climbs would have been a race between Tew, Roper & Walmsley whilst Brittain, Everiss & Charles would have contested the sprints. I have put Perks down as a rouleur.

The seven sets of attestation papers also show that, despite their consecutive regimental numbers, three attested at Walsall on 19th March 1901, three attested at Wolverhampton on 21st March and the seventh had a puncture on the way to Wolverhampton and attested on 3rd April 1901.

Their service records, with one exception, give their South African service dates as 23rd May 1901 to 25th June 1902. The exception is Robert Perks who opted to be discharged in South Africa. Newspaper reports show they went out on the Canada, their reported strength varied from newspaper to newspaper from 120 to 150. However, the medal roll lists only 5 Officers, 18 NCO’s & 82 Privates for a total of 105, sorry 108 as I forgot the 2 Cyclist Mechanics and the Drummer – not sure how the last operated successfully!

From the shipping records to be found on this site they returned on the Walmer Castle reduced to 5 officers and 75 other ranks and leaving South Africa on 25th June 1902 and arriving in England on 11th July 1902. This is the first time I have found on service records that the end date given for their South African service is the date they left South Africa rather than the date they arrived back at England with the voyage home contributing to their home service rather than their South African service.

They all appear on two “Composite Cyclists” medal rolls – one drawn up in South Africa on 20th August 1901 and showing they were entitled to the Cape Colony, Orange Free State and Transvaal clasps; the second drawn up in Chesterfield (England I presume) on 22nd April 1903 and shows they were also entitled, as one would expect, to the South Africa 1901 and South Africa 1902 clasps. The remarks column on the later medal roll shows why they were termed “Composite”, as shown on this page containing the names of Roper, Tew and Walmsley.



A newspaper article in the Walsall Advertiser dated 27th June 1903 reported that, although Brittain, Everiss, Charles & York had not received a welcome home, readers would be pleased to learn that in the past ten days they had received their South African medals with 5 clasps.

George Everiss wrote a letter home, an extract of which was published in the Walsall Observer of 14th September 1901 – disappointingly it does not mention his bicycle but here is the transcription I have made:

HOW THE BOERS SERVE OUR MEN
Private George Everiss, of the Walsall Volunteers, who, after being invalided home from South Africa, has gone out again, this time with the Cyclist Company, writing from Vereenging, Transvaal, under date August 16, 1901, to his parents at the Star and Garter, Station Street, Walsall says – this week we have been away on a column for three days, and can all think ourselves very lucky to get back again without being captured. We had to take up a position on a kopje, and then had to evacuate it and take up another position to protect the Mounted Infantry rear-guard, while they retired from a hot corner they had got into; and when the order came for us all to retire again, the Boers followed us up on the left flank, and as soon as we had crossed a drift opened fire on the left flank guard, capturing 23 of the Railway Pioneer Regiment, and killing two and wounding two of the same regiment. They also captured two of the M.I.’s, but all our fellows got off scot-free. Every man who was captured was stripped of all his clothes, and then set free again to walk back to camp – about five miles. It was laughable to see them walking back again in their birthday suit. Two of the men who were captured lost their way, and had to stay out on the veldt all night without a strip of clothing on, and it was raining all night long. I expect we shall be going back again to the same place with a stronger force and a few guns, as a large column has just come in here, and the men all swear what they will do if they get hold of any of the Boers for the way they served our men.

I have never ascended a kopje (although I did climb Thorpe Cloud a fortnight ago) but I imagine even a modern mountain bike would not make the task feasible.

George did also serve in the 1st VSC attached to the 1st South Staffs Regiment with the service number 6885. He was invalided home after less than 4 months in South Africa. He appears on Medal Rolls for the VSC qualifying for the Cape Colony, Orange Free State & South Africa 1901 clasps. There is no comment on all the medal rolls he appears on about his double service so did he receive two QSA’s? Despite his two bites of the cherry his time in South Africa totalled about 15 months so he did not qualify for the KSA.

When they were on their way home several laudatory paragraphs appeared in the newspapers of the – here are two:

St James Gazette - SERVICEABLE CYCLISTS. The 1st Composite Cyclist Company, which went to the front in May 1901, and is now nearing home, consisted of clerks, shopmen, mechanics and labourers with the essential qualification of being good cyclists – a qualification which was put to the test a thousand times during the war. They have had to act as despatch-riders and as escorts for prisoners, and cattle convoys. They have been placed on outpost duty, and as patrols on the railway in all winds and weathers. Though there were no roads in the sense understood at home, the cyclists were able to travel over the hard , rough surface of the veldt at a good speed, and occasionally even through mealie fields with grass up to the handlebars.

Cycling – Home Coming Soldier Cyclists. The cyclists who composed what was known as the 1std Composite Cyclist Co., and who went to the front in May 1901, are now on the way home. Little has been heard of them, but they have been doing excellent work all the time, acting as despatch riders and as escorts for prisoners. They have also done good service as outposts and patrols on the railways, and their cycles have been of great utility, notwithstanding the fact that in many parts roads do not exist and the riders have had to traverse miles of veldt. They are deserving of a good reception on their return.