FOREWORD
THE glorious Roll of Honour enshrined in this volume perpetuates
the names of 503 heroes who gave their lives for their Country
and the Empire, and of 3,566 equally heroic soldiers and sailors
and airmen, who, though not called upon to make the supreme sacrifice,
endured with sublime fortitude and even cheerfulness the terrible
trials of the Great War 1914-1919. Loss of limbs, destruction
of sight and undermined health from shell shock, trench fever,
malaria, rheumatism, gas-poisoning and semi-starvation, or other
ordeals endured as prisoners of war, were too well known to many
of those whose names are here inscribed. All the names, so far
as they have been discoverable, are here proudly and gratefully
recorded and handed down in these pages for the love and veneration
of our children and children's children who owe, perhaps their
lives, certainly their freedom, to the heroes thus commemorated.
If
on the graven and more enduring stone of the Port Sunlight War
Memorial, designed by the celebrated sculptor of our time —
Sir W. Goscombe John, R.A. — only the glorious dead are
by name commemorated, this is not at all because of the exceeding
great numbers of their comrades who fought and endured with them
the perils of the mighty struggle, and were equally ready to lay
down their lives also, but because, to their eternal honour, it
was the widely expressed desire of these survivors that the sculptured
monument should be wholly consecrated to the fallen as a memorial
of their supreme glory and fame.
Whether
commemorated in this book, or in stone and bronze, or in the traditions
to be handed on to future ages, it may well be said of all our
heroes: “Their name liveth for evermore.” Of all that
they did and suffered, far more than the half has never been,
and never can be, told. For all communications from the battle
areas were drastically censored, lest information useful to the
enemy forces should leak out; and, latterly, it was forbidden
to indicate in print — even in the ordinary obituary announcements
— the units or battalions to which the combatants belonged,
or to inform the local communities interested where their heroes
fought or bled or died. This, however, was always certain: the
employees of Lever Brothers were taking part in every scene of
action, whether on western or eastern fronts, in Europe, Africa,
or Asia, or on the seas. And even the censored letters from the
camps, the trenches, and the war vessels, especially the touching
and the high-spirited writings of the wounded and the captives;
the visible, unconcealable sufferings of the incessant streams
of maimed, injured and blinded heroes into the innumerable home
hospitals; the Gazette records of distinctions bestowed upon our
gallant men, and the services for which they had been conferred;
also the grim and ever-lengthening lists of war casualties, spoke
eloquently and unceasingly of what was happening by land and sea,
and of the magnificent part our own naval and military heroes
whose names are written in this book were taking in the tremendous
conflicts spread over four years and a half.
From
an analysis of the lists in this volume it is clear that the employees
of Lever Brothers who went on active service from the Works numbered
no fewer than 2,288 (including 23 women auxiliaries); from the
Offices at Port Sunlight and the Royal Liver Building, Liverpool,
480; and from the Branches in the United Kingdom (London, Liverpool,
Manchester, Birmingham, Cardiff, Bristol, Renfrew and Dublin),
517; a total of 3,285 from the United Kingdom. Our Overseas Associated
Companies (those bearing the name of Lever only included) had
on active service, from the United States 166, Australia and the
Pacific Islands 129, France 126, Canada 81, South Africa 62, and
Belgium, New Zealand, Japan, Holland and Italy 31 — a total
of 595; making up a grand total, as far as known, of 3,880. These
were distributed over at least six score different units of the
services, naval and military.
RESERVISTS.
At the outbreak of war the Naval and Army Reserves men moved quietly
and quickly to their stations, near and remote, 460 departing
with the knowledge of their departments, some without waiting
to say “Farewell!” In all the exciting experiences
of the first rush of war they took a noble part, checking the
enemy's advance on Paris, helping the Belgians in their unfortunate
plight at Antwerp, sharing in the gallant, though ill-favoured,
exploits in Gallipoli and the Dardanelles, or triumphing in the
naval battle of the Falkland Islands.
R.A.M.C.
MEN.
Among our earliest volunteers for the front were the members of
the St. John Ambulance Brigade, some of whom left Port Sunlight
on the third day of the war, with warm congratulations from our
Chairman and Directors on their prompt preparedness to represent
us in the humane work of the Royal Army Medical Corps. Some went
across the Channel and were soon heard of as attached to the 4th
Field Ambulance of the 2nd Division of the Expeditionary Force.
Some — including their leader at Port Sunlight — were
retained in England for hospital duties, which became more and
more arduous as the vessels bearing home the wounded came in after
every engagement on the Western front. Others were dispersed over
Eastern battle fields and facing exceptional dangers with a heroism
equal to the occasion.
R.E.
SUNLIGHT SECTION.
The Cheshire Field Company was the first Territorial Company of
the Royal Engineers to be sent to the front, early in the winter
of 1914, to earn in time the high encomium of the Commander-in-Chief
of the British Armies, Field Marshal Sir Douglas (afterward Earl)
Haig, that they had “performed prodigies of valour in France.”
No. 2 Section of this distinguished Company was entirely composed
of Lever Brothers' employees and was described by comrades as
“the Sunlight Section.”
THE
WIRRAL BATTALION AND LIVERPOOL “PALS.”
The largest contingents of recruits joined the Wirral Battalion
(13th Battalion The Cheshire Regiment) at Port Sunlight, mainly
from the Works there; and the Liverpool Regiment, particularly
the “ Pals Battalions (17th, 18th, 19th and 20th) raised
by Lord Derby at Liverpool — the corps which appealed peculiarly
to our clerical staffs in the Port Sunlight and Liverpool offices
at the Royal Liver Building and Highfield Street. As early as
November, 1914, within three months of the outbreak of war, no
fewer than 1,670 employees of Lever Brothers, including the Reservists
of all ranks and ratings, had already secured their places on
our Roll of Honour. It was publicly acknowledged that from Lever
Brothers came the greatest number of volunteers obtained from
any Works in the country. At the first recruiting meeting in the
Gladstone Hall, Port Sunlight, 500 of our men offered themselves
for the Wirral Battalion, and by September 7th, 1914 — a
day of high pride for our community, when the whole battalion
marched through Chester to the Army Headquarters there, with the
Chairman of Lever Brothers and Mr. Gershom Stewart, M.P., at its
head — the Port Sunlight contingent had increased to 700.
After a period of hard training on Salisbury Plain and at other
places in England, the Wirral Battalion went to France in 1916
as a unit of the new armies. There, in trench warfare; in that
grim and obdurate combat, the Battle of the Somme; in the fighting
for the Messines Ridge; through the slaughter and swamps of the
Ypres Battle in 1917; in all their long ordeal by fire, they quitted
themselves like men. Their fame was won at the cost of heavy sacrifice.
The official summary of their casualties up to December, 1917,
showed that of their officers 28 had been killed, 3 more reported
missing, and 68 had been wounded; of other ranks the killed numbered
293, the missing 415, and the wounded 1,458. It was in the successful
attack on the Westhoek Ridge that the Wirral Battalion sustained
most of these casualties. Ultimately, in February, 1918, its depleted
condition necessitated disbandment, and the dispersal of its members
among sister battalions.
Of
the Liverpool battalions, the Liverpool Scottish (popularly known
as the “Jocks”) and the 6th Liverpools were among
the earliest
Territorial
Regiments to take the field. In their ranks Lever Brothers' men
were engaged in historic battles, particularly at Hooge and St.
Eloi. In the “Pals” of the 18th Battalion under Lieut.-Colonel
Trotter, D.S.O., that commanding officer whom his men loved, Lever
Brothers were strongly represented. Like the Wirral Battalion,
they had a hard training, begun at Hooton and continued at Knowsley,
at Grantham, along the yellow-dusty roads of Lincolnshire, and
afterwards across the chalk plains of Salisbury, till they had
earned a name for smartness in ceremonial and keenness and efficiency
in field operations. The Brigade was given a place of honour on
the right of the British Army at the onset of the Somme offensive,
and from the celebrated French General Nourisson they earned a
tribute to their “remarkable bravery and discipline under
heavy and continuous fire.” The casualty list on the 5th
July, 1916, reduced the 18th Battalion's strength to 250 men,
and 3 out of 20 officers. And still they distinguished themselves
by stiff fighting in snowstorms in the opening stages of the Vimy
Ridge battle (April, 1917), took part in the battle of Ypres,
and did heroic work in delaying the German advance from St. Quentin
in March, 1918. The “Pals” last battle, in May of
that year, was characterised by major-General Pinney as the finest
bit of fighting he had seen in France.
LONDON
AND OTHER BRANCH OFFICES.
Thrilling narratives came in 1915 from men of the London Branch
Office who had joined the 6th Londons. This battalion was under
heavy fire when at Festubert during its first three weeks of trench
warfare, and six out of seven of our brave men were killed or
wounded. The fortunes of the other London Office soldiers were
bound up with those of a great number of other battalions —
the Norfolks, Royal Fusiliers, East Surreys, Essex Regiment, Rifle
Brigade, the Middlesex “Die Hards,” Royal West Kents,
Royal Berks, Sussex men, Dorsets, Somersets, Hampshires, London
Scottish (with whom we had Cruickshank, our V.C.), the Hon. Artillery
Company, and the King's Royal Rifles. Out of the 199 men who joined
from the” London staff, no fewer than 26 made the supreme
sacrifice. From the Manchester Branch Office 38 men enlisted,
mainly
in
the Battalions of the Manchester Regiment, including several “
City “ Battalions, corresponding to the Liverpool “
Pals,” who served side by side in France from 1915 onwards,
their comrades of other battalions taking part in the colossal
engagements in Gallipoli. The Manchester Office was further represented
in their county Regiments, and also in the Cheshires and Liverpools.
The Birmingham Branch Office, which also contributed 38 men to
the armies, was fortunate, inasmuch as it had no record of killed.
These men also served with “City” Battalions, and
with the Royal Warwicks, the Bedfords, the Leicesters, the County
Yeomanry and the Worcesters. Among other Branches, Cardiff, Bristol
and Renfrew sent respectively to the front 21, 33 and 40, of whom
1, 2 and 5 sacrificed their lives. Cardiff, naturally, was chiefly
associated with the “Welch” Regiment serving in France;
Bristol with the Worcesters and the Gloucesters, who were among
those who bore the brunt of the German artillery fire on the opening
day of the Somme battle of 1916. Renfrew was represented in the
Scots Guards, Royal Scots, Scottish Rifles and Cameron Highlanders,
units of which served in France and also in eastern areas of the
War, particularly Mesopotamia.
MOTORS
AND AMBULANCES.
It must not be concluded from these particular references to Lever
Brothers' employees who served their country as foot-soldiers,
that any neglect of those hundreds who joined other branches of
the Services is implied. The same story of cheery heroism may
be told of our employees with the R.F.A. and R.G.A., the R.A.F.
and Tank Corps; and a fine devotion to duty must be recorded of
our men in the administrative services. To a life distraught and
changed from that of peaceful days at home, a wistful whisper
of comfort was carried by the motors and ambulances that went
from Port Sunlight to the front. Our Chairman and Acting Chairman
each provided an ambulance, and within a few weeks of the Declaration
of War upwards of fifty of our motors were working with the Armies.
Their appearance in France gave joy to many of our employees,
a joy they were not slow to acknowledge in their letters home.
OVERSEAS
ASSOCIATED COMPANIES.
The records of the Overseas Associated Companies bearing the name
of “ Lever,” as well as those of the Head Offices
and Branches at home, with respect both to casualties and to decorations
and distinctions won by our valiant employees, will be found tabulated
at the end of the list of names. In the historic record of Canadian
and Australian valour our employees had an honourable share.
It will be observed that out of the grand total of 4,069 men on
service, 503 were killed (including the missing), 516 were wounded
once, 94 twice, 20 three times, and 6 four times. There were also
many prisoners of war.
The Naval and Military honours to the credit of the same body
of men are thus summed up: —
V.C.
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
O.B.E.,
1st, 2nd & 3rd Class |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
2 |
D.S.O.
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
3 |
O.B.E.,
4th & 5th Class |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
M.C.
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
21 |
D.F.C.
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
D.C.M.
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
11 |
D.S.M.
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
M.M.
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
52 |
M.S.M.
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
15 |
M.B.E.
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
Legion
of Honour |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
Croix
de Guerre |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
33 |
Medaille
Militaire |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
Medaille
Maroc |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
Gold
Medal of St. George |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
St.
George's Cross |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
Mention
in Despatches |
once
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
67 |
“ |
“ |
“
|
twice |
- |
- |
- |
- |
5
|
“ |
“ |
“
|
thrice |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
“ |
“ |
“
|
four
times |
- |
- |
- |
- |
2 |
Certificate
of Bravery in the Field |
- |
- |
- |
- |
1 |
Mention
for National Service |
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
4 |
PRIVATE
CRUICKSHANK, V.C.
The winner of the V.C. was Private Robert E. Cruickshank, of Lever
Brothers' London Office, who gained it for a display of the utmost
valour and endurance in the Palestine operations. There was a
call for volunteers to take a message up a slope and over extremely
dangerous ground. An officer who had previously attempted to take
the message had been shot dead. Private Cruickshank immediately
responded to the call and rushed up the slope three times, but
was wounded at each attempt, and rolled down again. He was wounded
so seriously at the third time that any further attempt was impossible.
He lay in his dangerous position all day under snipers' fire,
and was again wounded where he lay, yet was cheerful and uncomplaining
throughout.
SHIPPING
LOSSES.
Not included in the analysis of casualties are the lives lost
and the shipping destroyed in the course of the enemy's submarine
war on merchant vessels. On Sunday, June 6th, 1915, Lever Brothers'
barque “Sunlight” was torpedoed between Cape Clear
and Kinsale. The crew of 20 were fortunately rescued by a Government
trawler and brought into Queenstown. Our Associated Company, the
Bromport S.S. Company Limited, was incorporated on 29th April,
1916, and had a fleet of steamers with cargo capacity aggregating
about 27,000 tons. The sinking of the steamer “Delamere”
on 30th April, 1917, by an enemy submarine off the South Coast
of Ireland, was distinctly an attack on a non-combatant vessel,
on a passage home from the Congo and West African ports; 11 of
the crew were lost. On 13th October, 1917, the “Eskmere”
was torpedoed off Holyhead at one o'clock in the morning. The
Captain, 2 officers, all the engineers, and 14 of the crew of
28 were drowned. The “Redesmere,” on 28th October
of the same year, while proceeding from Barry Dock to Portsmouth
under Admiralty orders, was lost by enemy action about 4 o'clock
in the morning off Portsmouth. The only survivors out of a crew
of 25, including two gunners, were the Captain and five of the
crew. One of the African native firemen rescued the Captain in
a state of exhaustion, and for his bravery received from the Liverpool
Shipwreck and Humane Society their silver medal and their certificate
of thanks on vellum. A special gold medal was struck by the Company
for him and presented to him with a sum of money. The S.S. “Colemere,”
the largest vessel of the Bromport Company's fleet (4,050 tons)
was torpedoed and sunk in St. George's Channel on December 22nd,
1917. The Fourth Engineer and 3 of the crew of 34 were drowned.
HOME
SYMPATHY AND SUPPORT.
In a book expressly designed as a commemoration of those who served
in the Great War, making sacrifices even unto death, let there
be no detraction from their tribute by a long story of what was
done at home for heroes who did so much and infinitely more for
home protection and security. They were never out of the thoughts
of the great industrial community in which they left so many vacancies.
Hundreds of those who could not follow their workmates into the
field joined the Volunteer Force for Home Defence, Port Sunlight
contributing two complete companies to the 2nd Volunteer Battalion
the Cheshire Regiment. Women took their husbands' places in the
factory, and helped to “carry on” by shell-making.
Lever Brothers' Research Laboratory staff experimented in gases
to meet the enemy's poison gas, and had the satisfaction of hearing
their product called P.S. At the request of the Government our
Company built a new factory at Bromborough for margarine manufacture.
Gifts to funds and contributions to war loans ran into many hundred
thousands of pounds, and some £200,000 was disbursed by
the Company as allowances to the wives and dependants of the men
on active service; and, for that good cheer is even more than
money, the Chairman of Lever Brothers added to his share of the
funds a never-flagging optimism — the spirit which wins
a war. And won it was at last, thanks to the bravery of the bearers
of the names here enshrined. |