Whats in a Number ? D J Macrae 148,000 Scottish soldiers - TopicsExpress



          

Whats in a Number ? D J Macrae 148,000 Scottish soldiers died in ww1, and 272,000 were injured, a casualty rate of 26.5%, England had a lower rate of just 11.8%, in nearly every battle, the Scots made up 50% of the front line, in the battle of Loos for instance, the Scots made up 35 out of the 69 battalions to front the massive allied attack, and suffered a casualty rate of 44%, The Black Watch and Royal Scots were decimated, time and time again, the commanders of the British Army used Scottish, Welsh, Irish and commonwealth troops to front massive full frontal attacks, ignoring loss rates and almost throwing away mens lives like they meant nothing, indeed, they have been accused of doing so, and as history is made, the reputation of those Generals, who were lauded as heroes at the end of the war, is trodden through the muck, looking at those battles, and the troops they chose, its plain to see they used the Scots and commonwealth troops as expendables, there to front any badly planned suicide attack dreamed up by a drunk upper class, badly educated elite who thought themselves superior to the common man, indeed, ask any Canadian or Australians about the price their country paid for ww1, and you will be told the tales of Gallipoli and The Battle of Ancre Heights, where both lost thousands of men at the behest of British commanders, and are looked upon as disasters by both. So, we look at these numbers, and say to ourselves, what impact did that have on Scotland ?, the loss rate was double, and in many cases, because of the recruiting policy of having men and kin from the same town serving together, triple the loss rate of other British army units. Some towns lost over 1,000 men in one battle, Irving, which had a population of 23,000, lost 1,400 of its men on the 1st day of the Somme, areas lost a whole generation in one sweep of a german machine gun, and in some cases, wiped out a Scottish villages entire male population in under a minute, this had a devastating effect mainly in the highlands and islands, with many villages, fishing boats, farms and small crofts left without any men. After the effects of the clearances, the Napoleonic wars, the conquest of India, the rebel wars in Africa and ww1 and 2, it seems we have paid the ultimate price for the Union, go north, take a look into the empty glens, see all those stone rubble piles ?, Thats the price of 300 years of war, of fighting for an empire, every town and village in this Country displays the price, every war memorial a receipt of death from the Crown Parliament of the United Kingdom and British Isles, a thank you note from the mother parliament, I look upon them with shame, not for the sacrifice of the mens lives they honour, but for the betrayal of a ethos and a nation. Now that empire is dead, so we should end the Union, the price we paid was for that Empire, not the Union, so its time to bring our boys home, and no longer be cannon fodder for those upper class elites who control whats left of there glorious Britannia. I think the people of Scotland have paid enough in blood, History backs that up, and we can never be accused of taking more than we got, over a million Scots paid the price in 300 years of war, and aye, with that price PAID, we dont owe a single penny to that failed Empire, not a single penny....... if you enjoy this post, please share and like, thanks.
Posted on: Sun, 20 Apr 2014 21:53:01 +0000

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