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Liverpool medals

QSA and KSA medals to 5351 Pte Harry Brown 2nd Battalion Wiltshire Regiment.

Picture courtesy of Spink

QSA (5) Cape Colony, Transvaal, Wittebergen, South Africa 1901, South Africa 1902 (1348 Pte R. Lowther, 2nd Wilts: Regt)

R. Lowther served attached to the 2nd Battalion Wiltshire Regiment during the Boer War, from the Liverpool Regiment.

Now here's an interesting thing.

A while ago I asked a friend to retrieve files from a disk (Who uses those anymore?) which I found and had labelled as being sent to me in 2007 from a Peter Archibald in NSW Australia. Attached to the disk was a note with his email address and "Purchased in a flea market in the early 1960's at Manly, Sydney. 2nd Wilts January 1900". This attached photograph was the only thing on the disk.

I remember that an email from this guy said that he had purchased this as a framed picture and "2nd Wilts January 1900" was scribbled on the back of the frame.

I've tried to email him, but the email address is no longer valid, so I have no way of contacting him. In fact I don't know if he's even still alive and know nothing about him. I can't even remember how he got in contact with me.

Anyway, only a few days ago I came across the same image on Amazon of all places, for sale from a company called Science Source.

I don't know how images get to be owned by a company, but I regularly see images on stock image company websites which should actually be Public Domain as the images originated from well known companies from that time eg Underwood or Keystone and are long out of copyright.

Anyway, the attached image came to me from Mr Archibald many years ago.

Now, look at the Officer in front of the soldiers. He's a bit taller than the rest. I think it could be Lt Henry Paton Rogers. He commanded A Company in January 1900 and died of Enteric fever on 13/05/1900. I'm thinking that if it is him (and I don't know of any other particularly tall officers at this time) that the soldiers in this photograph would probably be A Company. I've asked the Rifles Berkshire and Wiltshire Regiment Museum to have a look.

What exactly are the soldiers doing? Anything else apart from marching?

The only action in January 1900 was a reconnaissance in force at Rietfontein, Cape Colony on 25/01/1900.

I have no idea of how an Infantry Company formed up back in 1900, but assume that this would be how they might look before they extended into a firing line? Or do Infantry spread out before moving off?

Anyway I wanted to share the image.

A member of the Rifles Berkshire and Wiltshire Regiment Museum has pointed out that the soldiers look rather well turned out, so believes that this is some sort of parade. The officer has not yet been conclusively identified.

The state of the soldiers' uniforms would certainly fit with early war appearance. The Wiltshires had just arrived so their uniforms would still have been in their best condition.

A simple, but nice photograph.