S/43472 Pte
2nd Battalion, Gordon Highlanders, 20th Infantry Brigade, 7th Division
Age: 21
Date of Death: Killed in Action 4 October 1917
Buried: Tyne Cot Memorial, Panel 135-136
Family history: He was the son of Archibald and Elizabeth Campbell of 32 James Street, Laurieston. Employed as a slater with Messrs T McGregor & Sons of Laurieston. He joined the Cameron Highlanders in February 1916, however; after his training he was transferred to the Gordon Highlanders.
The action leading to his death
The third thrust in the Third Ypres offensive, the Battle of Broodseinde Ridge, came on the 4 October. The ridge was the objective of the 7th Division and the 1st Australian Brigade on its left. The 7th Division had as its objective the hamlet of Noordemhoek on the Broodseinde - Becelaere road. Indeed the 7th Division was merely trying to secure much of the same line as that taken up by the Division on October 19th, 1914. The first objective was allotted to a single battalion, the 8th Devonshire. The 2nd Border Regiment and 2nd Gordon Highlanders were to take the final objective beyond the crest of the ridge, the ruined hamlet of Noordemhoek. Next to the Gordons was the 4th Australian Battalion of the 1st Australian Brigade, which had bombed along the Hindenburg Line at Bullecourt to join hands with the Gordons. The brigade commander had made an appeal they should fight beside his men today.
The Germans put down a barrage behind the leading battalion and partly on the support and reserve companies of the Gordons, an hour before the attack. The 2nd Gordons moved off behind the 8th Devonshire at 6am and advanced 400 yards beyond the start line of Jubilee Trench. The officers had great difficulty in restraining men from going on with the Devonshire, and afterwards it appeared that some had done so. At 8.10am the barrage moved on again as the war diary puts it ‘driving everything before it’
Only when the battalion reached its final objective did it begin to suffer severely. The German shelling was very heavy and almost continuous. In most cases its losses were higher from artillery bombardment than from the machine gun fire which met the attack. The Gordons had 40 casualties on 4 October.