Nick Bastin's Blog

Review from The Highlander, the Regimental Newsletter of the Highlanders (Seaforth, Gordons and Camerons).

I am extremely delighted to be able to share a review of From the Frontline of History by Brigadier (Ret’d) Charles Grant OBE, Regimental historian, in the latest edition of The Highlander, the Regimental Newsletter of the Highlanders (Seaforth, Gordons and Camerons).

There can be no greater pleasure for a writer than to see their work appreciated by true experts in their field and I would like to thank Brigadier Grant for his kind words.

FROM THE FRONTLINE OF HISTORY

Teddy Campion at war with the Seaforth Highlanders 1895 -1916.

By Nick Bastin.

“From the Frontline of History” is the story of a remarkable man – Teddy Campion. Born in 1873 he joined the army in 1893 and transferred from the local regiment to the Seaforth Highlanders in 1895. His first posting was to Crete. To quote the author:

“Teddy's first overseas posting had been highly unusual for the time; international cooperation and a peace keeping mission which has more in keeping with the late 20th Century. For a man brought up on the tales of his father, who had experienced the ferocious set-piece battles in the Crimea and the Indian Mutiny, it must have seemed a let-down, but his next posting to Sudan would be very different.”

Indeed, it was. Teddy’s accounts of Atbara and Omdurman are a must read. They are not sterile accounts of these great battles but are vividly described by Teddy who was there. His sketch maps are an absolute joy to the historian.

After a brief interval we re-join Teddy towards the end of the Boer War. The account is accompanied by some wonderful phototrophs. His reflections at the end of the campaign provide a very interesting insight into the war and the “apologists and supporters of the Boers in Britain”.

I will only mention that the next period covers Teddy’s time in India, his polo career and his return to Scotland. It is the second half of the book that covers the Great War and Teddy’s all too brief life until his death February 1916. In 1914 Teddy was with the 2nd Battalion Seaforth Highlanders.

“The 2nd Battalion Seaforth Highlanders were mobilized on 4 August 1914 - the very day that war was declared. By 7 August they had already been joined by 620 reservists. They then entrained from Shorncliffe to York and spent the next week moving around the country before being embarking for France from Southampton on 22 August onboard the SS Lake Michigan, landing in Boulogne on 23 August and that night entraining to join the 10th Infantry Brigade and be pitched straight into the Battle of Le Cateau.”

Teddy’s account of the retreat from Le Cateau covering the period 24 August to 5 September is are remarkable insight into the retreat of the British expeditionary Force (B.E.F) and concludes with a list of tactical insights which he introduces with the comment “As regards tactical thinking, we have learnt there is nothing new but neglect over them has cost a lot of casualties in various units.”

From now on Teddy was in “Flanders Fields”. After describing a number of actions, we come to the Second Battle of Ypres. I will resist the temptation to draw extracts from Teddy’s remarkable description of the battle which deserves to be read in full. But instead mention what happened to Teddy. Major Teddy Campion had assumed command of the 2nd Seaforth Battalion on the wounding of the commanding officer and death of the senior major.

“On 2 May, at around 5.30 p.m., the Germans sent over a cloud of chlorine gas, after which they attacked”. This was the same technique they had used against the French and Canadians – first they used the gas to poison or incapacitate the enemy, and then they pressed home their attack once the clouds of gas had dispersed. Knowing this incursion would be disastrous, Teddy commanded the Battalion to stand firm and repulse attack. Which they did.

Despite being gassed himself Teddy remained in post until 6 May. There can be no other reason than there was no one else to take command. Between 25 April and 8 May the Battalion had lost 28 of its 36 officers killed, wounded or gassed. Finally, he was hospitalized and sent home. Remarkably when others might have been invalided out, he remained convalescing for 4 months in Britain before returning to the front on 11 September 1915 and being formally gazette in the post of temporary Lieutenant Colonel commanding the Battalion. He had however not recovered fully from the gas attack. He was hospitalized on 17 November. With a brief interlude at home for Christmas he remained in hospital and died on 25 February 1916.

A year after his death an extraordinary document came into the family possession. It was an order by Teddy Campion dated 3 April 1915 and predates the first use of gas by only a couple of weeks:

To O.C. Coy [Officer Commanding Company] and men to see. Remember no Seaforth Highlander ever has left or ever will leave his post.

Whatever damnable engine of war the enemy use the Seaforths will stick it out and will have their reward in killing the enemy .

E. Campion Major Commander 2nd Battalion Seaforth Highlanders

Clearly based on the anticipated use of this terrible weapon it is a poignant record of the leadership of this exceptional soldier who would meet his end as a result of this dreadful weapon.

As a military historian one can only be delighted by the wonderful detail of the military operations covered in this book. As a former soldier one can only admire this moving record of a remarkable man and as a reader one is left with overwhelming admiration and a tinge of sadness for Teddy Campion.

Brigadier (Ret’d) C S Grant OBE

The spread from the magazine.

View more on Nick Bastin's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on January 29, 2023 11:07

Boredom - the soldier’s lot

On campaign in the Sudan from the Daily Graphic

In From the Frontline of History we read of Teddy Campion’s experiences in the great set piece battles of Omdurman and Atbara, as well as skirmishing in the Boer War and trench warfare in WWI. These moments of high drama and adrenalin are naturally few and far between. But Teddy is also an amusing documenter of the boredom that made up so much of the soldier’s lot. Here Teddy colourfully describes the passage of a day in his Sudan diary:

Get up, hastily swallow a cup of cocoa, light a cigarette and find 50 bearded looking ruffians at the quarter guard. We get tools and commence to fill up a huge hole - why, no one quite knows, or cares – but you must not leave the men alone and on no account are they to be allowed to wash. So you keep them at it till time for breakfast.

One goes back for a bath – breakfast porridge and a lump of heart – (sometimes varied with a weird and wonderful looking kidney – but usually we have a fair breakfast). Then orderly room. Return at about 10 a.m. Work for the day finished.

Everything is getting hot. Order ginger ale – drink it, have another. It all comes out and trickles down your forehead. Go to your house?? Or dog–hole – gasp – look at thermometer: 104 degrees. Have another ginger ale on strength of it. Write diary, begin letter, hand all wet from perspiration smudges it. Lie down – perspire fearfully – swear at the flies. Try and kill one, very exhausting – have another ginger ale. 12 O’clock go to sleep – wake up 1 p.m. Lunch – everyone rather slack – read paper – long for 4 p.m. Have a small gin and ginger ale – tea. It begins to get cooler.

Get a rifle, trudge off into the desert and shoot at a gazelle – this is great fun. Return 6 p.m. very hot and thirsty. Have a small gin and Bradford. Visitors come round. Everyone bucks and talks; this is a most enjoyable time of day.

Change for dinner – have an excellent dinner – everyone cheery and fit. Drink a bottle of Pilsner and begin to feel life is worth living – go to bed 10 p.m.

You can read more about Sudan and Teddy’s other experiences in Crete, the Boer War, India and WWI in From the Frontline of History, Teddy Campion at War with the Seaforth Highlanders, 1895 – 1916 available from Amazon.

View more on Nick Bastin's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on November 27, 2022 01:58

1st Review of From the Frontline of History

Many thanks to Brian Palmer for his kind review of From the Frontline of History, Teddy Campion at War with the Seaforth Highlanders 1895 – 1916 in the latest edition of The Ileach, the brilliant Independent Newspaper of Islay and Jura.

See below for the full text.

From the Frontline of History. Teddy Campion at war with the Seaforth Highlanders 1895-1916.

Nick Bastin. Paperback £14.99

Author Nick Bastin has previously featured in the Ileach via reviews of his excellent fictional trilogy, ‘The Book of the Black Tower’, but in this, his latest publication, he revisits the copious and fastidiously kept diaries of Edward (Teddy) Campion, who joined the Seaforth Highlanders (named after the sea loch in the Outer Hebrides) as a 2nd Lieutenant and rose to the rank of Major.

Teddy Campion was born on 18 December 1873 into a “…privileged, aristocratic family in the late-Victorian era…”, but as the third and youngest son in the family, he was effectively excluded from any future inheritance and would have to make his own way in the world.

Teddy’s father had served as a Captain in the Duke of Albany’s own Highlanders, subsequently merged with the 78th Highlanders Regiment of Foot to create the 1st Battalion Seaforth Highlanders.

Educated at Eton, he attended the Royal Military College, Sandhurst and his decision to join the Seaforths was undoubtedly influenced by his father and his connections. The author makes it plain, when asking why we should be interested in Campion, that he performed no amazing deeds of derring-do, nor were there any Victoria crosses bestowed.

However, as Nick Bastin points out in his introduction, “What sets Teddy apart is that he was a great diarist, and from his earliest overseas service until his death, he has left us a trail of diaries and letters…”

His diaries describe in detail, the battles of Atbara and Omdurman, ostensibly the last of the ‘traditionally fought’ battles of the 19th century.

He also recorded the building of blockhouses during the Boer War, devices implemented by the British to “…break up the Boers’ freedom of movement.” It was pretty dull work, by all accounts.

Perhaps the portion of the book that will garner greatest interest from contemporary readers are Campion’s diaries from the First World War. Preceding these, in his introduction, the author states, “The losses are unimaginable today. Between April and May 1915, 95% of the officers and 112% of the NCOs and men of the 2nd battalion Seaforth Highlanders were killed, missing or wounded.”

Campion was gassed on 2 May 1915, but remained at his post until 6 May “…unquestionably causing severe damage to his health…” This he did in the knowledge that there were very few senior officers left to command the remnants of the battalion.

Incredibly, he returned to the front line on 11 September that year, but ultimately succumbed to complications engendered by his gassing. He died on 25 February 1916 at the age of 42.

A poignant note at the end of Teddy’s May diary entry stated, “On 2nd May our respirators were found to be no good being made of nothing but woollen waistbelts.”

From the Frontline of History is available from Amazon.