John Ferguson had the honour of bearing his father's name. His mother Julia Moylan and siblings James, Catherine, Mary Anne and Ellen lived at 122.1 Great Georges Street, Belfast per 1901 Census. The home was shared with other relatives. Granda John Moylan and his Uncles Pat and Eddie, Aunt Mary and Cousin Peter, so it was a pretty full household for John who was then a 2 year old toddler.
The census lent important facts to the life of young John Ferguson and establish his age as 2 years old in 1901. His sister Ellen had not yet been born. Sister Julia born in 1891 was deceased. His father died in 1901 at the Union Infirmary and he is buried in public ground at the City Cemetery. His older brother James was also deceased by 1911. This meant some drastic changes in young John's life as the family he was so used to living with would break up and find other places to live. His mother and siblings moved to 10 Great Georges Street and he resided there until the death of his mother in 1915. John's sister Catherine stepped into the parenting role for the family. Mary Anne had married in 1914 to Charles Neeson also a Connaught Ranger #2550. Perhaps these circumstances motivated John to grow up to quickly, to look to make his own way in the world, to become a man. What makes a boy a man quicker than war?
John enlisted in the 6th Connaught Rangers at Fermoy, County Cork on 16 July 1915 under the false information that he was then 19 years old, using 1896 as his year of birth. He was in fact a boy of barely 16 years. This is supported by both 1901 and 1911 census.
Prior to enlisting he was an assistant postman and the family – consisting of Sisters Catherine, Sarah and Ellen had moved to 12 McCleery Street. Sister Mary Anne would move into the home with her sisters when as a new mother to baby daughter Julia her husband Charles Neeson would also be in France fighting the war with the 6th Connaught Rangers (KIA October 11 1918).
John is described as being 5' 4-3/4", 114lbs, 36-1/2" chest, in good health and with no identifying marks.
John spent 5 months training in Fermoy before moving to Blackdown, England in September of 1915. He suffered with Impetigo and was hospitalized 27 November – 03 December 1915 just prior to being shipped to France on 17 December 1915 as part of the British Expeditionary Forces. He would experience the war first hand with The Battle of the Somme at Guillemont and Ginchy were the 6th took heavy losses.
John suffered gas poisoning July 1 1916 on the first day of the Battle of the Somme – termed "Gas Drift". He was taken on the H.S. Dieppe to London General Hospital, England to receive treatment for the effects of the gas from 9th July to 19 July 1916. He was posted to the 4th Connaught Rangers 03 August 1916. Between discharge from hospital and posting to the 4th CR's, John was deducted 5 days' pay "for his keep". On October 20 1916 John was again transferred, this time to the 1st Connaught Rangers as part of the Indian Expeditionary Force (IEP). He returned to action disembarking in Basra on 16 December 1916. He was again admitted to field hospital January 15 1917 cause is listed as NYD (Not Yet Determined – possibly heat related). He suffered arm and neck injuries 26 January 1917 and was hospitalized again until 9 February 1917. Once more John became ill this time with Diphtheria requiring more hospitalization from 1-21 March 1917, returning again to his unit on discharge.
In addition to battling the enemy the IEF soldiers faced heat related illnesses, many succumbing to heat stroke. They were hungry and even thirsty as the Turkish prevented their supply ships from getting through. On top of that they dealt with mosquitos and a cholera outbreak; all while fighting battles at Kut 23 February 1917, Fall of Bagdad on 11 March 1917, Samarrah Offensive - March 13-April 23 1917, Conquered Fallujah March 19 1917, and taking the Town of Samarrah and its railroad on April 23 1917.
On 11 July 1917 John was part of the Field Infantry at Makina Masus. The British column from Feluja (Euphrates) engaged with Turkish forces up the river. The Turks inflicted considerable loss on the British. (Mesopotamia Campaign). Unfortunately John was critically injured in this battle. His records do not state the actual wounds sustained only that he died from them the same day - 11 July 1917. (Nb: some names spelt differently in WW1 records - Faluja/Fallujah, Mesopotamia is now Iraq)
Pte. Fergusons' final medical report would state "Soldier – Non Effective" – "Dying of Wounds".
John was buried at Dialeh (Diyala) Cemetery 12 miles S.E. of Bagdad and his body was later exhumed for reburial with military honours at Dhibban Cemetery on Euphrates, 8 miles West by North of Fallujah, Mesopotamia. Plot: 68.1, N. 1881/A.
Soldiers who died in WW1 fighting with British Forces received a letter of condolence from King George V. This was accompanied by a Memorial Scroll and Plaque which the soldiers promptly nicknamed the "Death Penny". This was in keeping with the Greek Mythology that one had to pay their passage to the afterlife and the resemblance of the plaque to the large English Penny.
These items were mailed to the next of kin in a brown cardboard package throughout 1920 and many found the "Penny" to be offensive to the lives of their lost loved ones in that their lives were attributed to the value of a penny. Many people returned the "plaques' for this reason.
Catherine Ferguson Reid received one final thing from the War Office – John's final salary, a total amount of three shillings and sixpence or 3/6-.
The Dead Man's Penny:
The history of the Dead Man's Penny began in 1916 with the realization by the British Government that some form of an official token of gratitude should be given to the fallen service men and women's bereaved next of kin. The enormous casualty figures not anticipated at the start of WWI back in 1914 prompted this gesture of recognition. In 1917, the government announced a competition to design a suitable plaque with a prize of 250 pounds.
There were 800 entries from all over the Empire, the Dominions, and even from the troops on the Western Front. Mr. E. Carter Preston of Liverpool, England, was the eventual winner. Mr. Carter's initials are included in the design of the penny just above the lion's right forepaw.
The selected design was a 12-centimetre disk cast in bronze gunmetal, which incorporated the following; an image of Britannia and a lion, two dolphins representing Britain's sea power and the emblem of Imperial Germany's eagle being torn to pieces by another lion. Britannia is holding an oak spray with leaves and acorns. Beneath this was a rectangular tablet where the deceased individual's name was cast into the plaque. No rank was given as it was intended to show equality in their sacrifice. On the outer edge of the disk, the words, ‘He died for freedom and honour'. The Plaques were manufactured at old armament factories.
So why are they called Dead Man's Penny? Ancient Greek and Roman mythology is that the River Styx forms the boundary between Earth and the Underworld. A ferryman, Charon, would ferry the souls of the newly dead across the river if they were able to pay the toll. To ensure the toll was available relatives would bury a body with a coin in the mouth. The design of the memorial plaque is similar to the penny coin of 1918 and associated with the death of servicemen and women; leading the soldiers to give it the nickname, Dead Man's Penny.
MEDALS AWARDED - Service WW1:
The 1914-15 British Star was a campaign medal awarded for service in WW1. It was approved in 1918 for issue to officers and men of the British and Imperial Forces who served in any theatre of the War between August 5 1914 and 31 December 1915. (Other than those who had already received the 1914 Star). Also issued was the British War Medal and the Victory Medal. These medals were ‘irreverently referred to as Pip (British Star), Squeak (British War Medal) and Wilfred (Victory Medal).
The medals were sent to John's sister Catherine Ferguson Reid at their home address in 1920. Many of the families returned the medals to the war office in protest of the treatment of the Irish during the 1916 Easter Rising, The Indian Mutiny and the lost ‘promise' of the British Government to grant Home Rule which was used as a recruitment strategy to ‘encourage' Irish men to fight for the British Forces during WW1.
AFTER THE WAR:
The freedom Pte. John Ferguson fought for, would not be one he lived to enjoy. His sisters continued to live at 12 McCleery Street, Mary Anne and Sarah Jane working in Gallagher's Cigarette Factory as Tobacco Spinners and Catherine keeping home.
The H.S. Dieppe once a steam passenger ship had been requisitioned by the navy during WW1 and converted to a hospital ship. On 27 February 1916 she took aboard over 100 survivors from the passenger liner Maloja which was sunk by a mine off Dover. The ship was returned to its owners after the war and was sold in 1933 to W.E. Guinness (1st Baron of Moyne); who turned it into his personal yacht. She was renamed Rosaura. It is said this is the ship where Wallace Simpson fell in love with the Prince of Wales while taking a cruise on the Rosaura in August 1934.
The Rosaura was again requisitioned during WW2 for use as an armed boarding vessel in Contraband Control. It was involved in Operation Abstention (code name given to the British invasion of the Italian island of Kastelorizo. The ship struck a mine off Tobruk on 18 March 1941 and sank, claiming the lives of 78 people.
In 1914, Baghdad was the headquarters of the Turkish Army in Mesopotamia. It was the ultimate objective of the Indian Expeditionary Force 'D' and the goal of the force besieged and captured at Kut in 1916. The city finally fell in March 1917, but the position was not fully consolidated until the end of April. Nevertheless, it had by that time become the Expeditionary Force's advanced base, with two stationary hospitals and three casualty clearing stations.
The North Gate Cemetery was begun In April 1917 and has been greatly enlarged since the end of the First World War by graves brought in from other burial grounds in Baghdad and northern Iraq, and from battlefields and cemeteries in Anatolia where Commonwealth prisoners of war were buried by the Turks. At present, 4,160 Commonwealth casualties of the First World War are commemorated by name in the cemetery, many of them on special memorials. Unidentified burials from this period number 2,729.
The cemetery also contains the grave of Lieutenant General Sir Stanley Maude, Commander-in-Chief of the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force, who died at Baghdad in November 1917 and the memorial to the 13th Division which he commanded. A memorial to the 6th Battalion Loyal (North Lancashire) Regiment was brought into the cemetery from the banks of the Diyala River in 1947. (Courtesy of Commonwealth War Graves Commission).
Due to the political instability of the region it is no longer possible to maintain the War Cemeteries in this area and many of the headstones have been destroyed. In some cases whole graveyards completely decimated. A recent article in The Telegraph shows the destruction of the soldiers headstones .
Report by Colin Freeman: The Telegraph November 13 2013 reports: (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/britain-at-war/10438147/Iraq-cemetery-containing-graves-of-British-servicemen-is-destroyed.html)
A First and Second World War cemetery in Basra has been destroyed by vandals and looters. A cemetery in Iraq that contains the graves of thousands of British servicemen who died in the two World Wars has been completely destroyed.
The Basra war cemetery is one of several around southern Iraq that date back to the British Mesopotamian campaign of 1914
The graveyard in Basra has been left without a single one of its 4,000 headstones still standing after repeated vandalism and looting in the years since the fall of Saddam Hussein.
When British troops first took control of the city in 2003, wreaths were laid at the cemetery on Remembrance Sunday for the first time in decades.
Some soldiers even honoured the graves of relatives who had died in action during the Mesopotamian campaign of World War One.
But the growing insurgent threat soon made it impractical for British forces to protect it, and after their withdrawal from the city in 2007, it was too dangerous for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission to send teams to repair the damage.
It is not the name engraved on Portland Stone that make us remember our fallen heroes, it is the names engraved upon our hearts and in the stories handed down, in our history, in our pride, in continuing the story of who we are and the peace and freedom for which we fought. It is in honouring our dead that we remember, Let us remember well.
The census lent important facts to the life of young John Ferguson and establish his age as 2 years old in 1901. His sister Ellen had not yet been born. Sister Julia born in 1891 was deceased. His father died in 1901 at the Union Infirmary and he is buried in public ground at the City Cemetery. His older brother James was also deceased by 1911. This meant some drastic changes in young John's life as the family he was so used to living with would break up and find other places to live. His mother and siblings moved to 10 Great Georges Street and he resided there until the death of his mother in 1915. John's sister Catherine stepped into the parenting role for the family. Mary Anne had married in 1914 to Charles Neeson also a Connaught Ranger #2550. Perhaps these circumstances motivated John to grow up to quickly, to look to make his own way in the world, to become a man. What makes a boy a man quicker than war?
John enlisted in the 6th Connaught Rangers at Fermoy, County Cork on 16 July 1915 under the false information that he was then 19 years old, using 1896 as his year of birth. He was in fact a boy of barely 16 years. This is supported by both 1901 and 1911 census.
Prior to enlisting he was an assistant postman and the family – consisting of Sisters Catherine, Sarah and Ellen had moved to 12 McCleery Street. Sister Mary Anne would move into the home with her sisters when as a new mother to baby daughter Julia her husband Charles Neeson would also be in France fighting the war with the 6th Connaught Rangers (KIA October 11 1918).
John is described as being 5' 4-3/4", 114lbs, 36-1/2" chest, in good health and with no identifying marks.
John spent 5 months training in Fermoy before moving to Blackdown, England in September of 1915. He suffered with Impetigo and was hospitalized 27 November – 03 December 1915 just prior to being shipped to France on 17 December 1915 as part of the British Expeditionary Forces. He would experience the war first hand with The Battle of the Somme at Guillemont and Ginchy were the 6th took heavy losses.
John suffered gas poisoning July 1 1916 on the first day of the Battle of the Somme – termed "Gas Drift". He was taken on the H.S. Dieppe to London General Hospital, England to receive treatment for the effects of the gas from 9th July to 19 July 1916. He was posted to the 4th Connaught Rangers 03 August 1916. Between discharge from hospital and posting to the 4th CR's, John was deducted 5 days' pay "for his keep". On October 20 1916 John was again transferred, this time to the 1st Connaught Rangers as part of the Indian Expeditionary Force (IEP). He returned to action disembarking in Basra on 16 December 1916. He was again admitted to field hospital January 15 1917 cause is listed as NYD (Not Yet Determined – possibly heat related). He suffered arm and neck injuries 26 January 1917 and was hospitalized again until 9 February 1917. Once more John became ill this time with Diphtheria requiring more hospitalization from 1-21 March 1917, returning again to his unit on discharge.
In addition to battling the enemy the IEF soldiers faced heat related illnesses, many succumbing to heat stroke. They were hungry and even thirsty as the Turkish prevented their supply ships from getting through. On top of that they dealt with mosquitos and a cholera outbreak; all while fighting battles at Kut 23 February 1917, Fall of Bagdad on 11 March 1917, Samarrah Offensive - March 13-April 23 1917, Conquered Fallujah March 19 1917, and taking the Town of Samarrah and its railroad on April 23 1917.
On 11 July 1917 John was part of the Field Infantry at Makina Masus. The British column from Feluja (Euphrates) engaged with Turkish forces up the river. The Turks inflicted considerable loss on the British. (Mesopotamia Campaign). Unfortunately John was critically injured in this battle. His records do not state the actual wounds sustained only that he died from them the same day - 11 July 1917. (Nb: some names spelt differently in WW1 records - Faluja/Fallujah, Mesopotamia is now Iraq)
Pte. Fergusons' final medical report would state "Soldier – Non Effective" – "Dying of Wounds".
John was buried at Dialeh (Diyala) Cemetery 12 miles S.E. of Bagdad and his body was later exhumed for reburial with military honours at Dhibban Cemetery on Euphrates, 8 miles West by North of Fallujah, Mesopotamia. Plot: 68.1, N. 1881/A.
Soldiers who died in WW1 fighting with British Forces received a letter of condolence from King George V. This was accompanied by a Memorial Scroll and Plaque which the soldiers promptly nicknamed the "Death Penny". This was in keeping with the Greek Mythology that one had to pay their passage to the afterlife and the resemblance of the plaque to the large English Penny.
These items were mailed to the next of kin in a brown cardboard package throughout 1920 and many found the "Penny" to be offensive to the lives of their lost loved ones in that their lives were attributed to the value of a penny. Many people returned the "plaques' for this reason.
Catherine Ferguson Reid received one final thing from the War Office – John's final salary, a total amount of three shillings and sixpence or 3/6-.
The Dead Man's Penny:
The history of the Dead Man's Penny began in 1916 with the realization by the British Government that some form of an official token of gratitude should be given to the fallen service men and women's bereaved next of kin. The enormous casualty figures not anticipated at the start of WWI back in 1914 prompted this gesture of recognition. In 1917, the government announced a competition to design a suitable plaque with a prize of 250 pounds.
There were 800 entries from all over the Empire, the Dominions, and even from the troops on the Western Front. Mr. E. Carter Preston of Liverpool, England, was the eventual winner. Mr. Carter's initials are included in the design of the penny just above the lion's right forepaw.
The selected design was a 12-centimetre disk cast in bronze gunmetal, which incorporated the following; an image of Britannia and a lion, two dolphins representing Britain's sea power and the emblem of Imperial Germany's eagle being torn to pieces by another lion. Britannia is holding an oak spray with leaves and acorns. Beneath this was a rectangular tablet where the deceased individual's name was cast into the plaque. No rank was given as it was intended to show equality in their sacrifice. On the outer edge of the disk, the words, ‘He died for freedom and honour'. The Plaques were manufactured at old armament factories.
So why are they called Dead Man's Penny? Ancient Greek and Roman mythology is that the River Styx forms the boundary between Earth and the Underworld. A ferryman, Charon, would ferry the souls of the newly dead across the river if they were able to pay the toll. To ensure the toll was available relatives would bury a body with a coin in the mouth. The design of the memorial plaque is similar to the penny coin of 1918 and associated with the death of servicemen and women; leading the soldiers to give it the nickname, Dead Man's Penny.
MEDALS AWARDED - Service WW1:
The 1914-15 British Star was a campaign medal awarded for service in WW1. It was approved in 1918 for issue to officers and men of the British and Imperial Forces who served in any theatre of the War between August 5 1914 and 31 December 1915. (Other than those who had already received the 1914 Star). Also issued was the British War Medal and the Victory Medal. These medals were ‘irreverently referred to as Pip (British Star), Squeak (British War Medal) and Wilfred (Victory Medal).
The medals were sent to John's sister Catherine Ferguson Reid at their home address in 1920. Many of the families returned the medals to the war office in protest of the treatment of the Irish during the 1916 Easter Rising, The Indian Mutiny and the lost ‘promise' of the British Government to grant Home Rule which was used as a recruitment strategy to ‘encourage' Irish men to fight for the British Forces during WW1.
AFTER THE WAR:
The freedom Pte. John Ferguson fought for, would not be one he lived to enjoy. His sisters continued to live at 12 McCleery Street, Mary Anne and Sarah Jane working in Gallagher's Cigarette Factory as Tobacco Spinners and Catherine keeping home.
The H.S. Dieppe once a steam passenger ship had been requisitioned by the navy during WW1 and converted to a hospital ship. On 27 February 1916 she took aboard over 100 survivors from the passenger liner Maloja which was sunk by a mine off Dover. The ship was returned to its owners after the war and was sold in 1933 to W.E. Guinness (1st Baron of Moyne); who turned it into his personal yacht. She was renamed Rosaura. It is said this is the ship where Wallace Simpson fell in love with the Prince of Wales while taking a cruise on the Rosaura in August 1934.
The Rosaura was again requisitioned during WW2 for use as an armed boarding vessel in Contraband Control. It was involved in Operation Abstention (code name given to the British invasion of the Italian island of Kastelorizo. The ship struck a mine off Tobruk on 18 March 1941 and sank, claiming the lives of 78 people.
In 1914, Baghdad was the headquarters of the Turkish Army in Mesopotamia. It was the ultimate objective of the Indian Expeditionary Force 'D' and the goal of the force besieged and captured at Kut in 1916. The city finally fell in March 1917, but the position was not fully consolidated until the end of April. Nevertheless, it had by that time become the Expeditionary Force's advanced base, with two stationary hospitals and three casualty clearing stations.
The North Gate Cemetery was begun In April 1917 and has been greatly enlarged since the end of the First World War by graves brought in from other burial grounds in Baghdad and northern Iraq, and from battlefields and cemeteries in Anatolia where Commonwealth prisoners of war were buried by the Turks. At present, 4,160 Commonwealth casualties of the First World War are commemorated by name in the cemetery, many of them on special memorials. Unidentified burials from this period number 2,729.
The cemetery also contains the grave of Lieutenant General Sir Stanley Maude, Commander-in-Chief of the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force, who died at Baghdad in November 1917 and the memorial to the 13th Division which he commanded. A memorial to the 6th Battalion Loyal (North Lancashire) Regiment was brought into the cemetery from the banks of the Diyala River in 1947. (Courtesy of Commonwealth War Graves Commission).
Due to the political instability of the region it is no longer possible to maintain the War Cemeteries in this area and many of the headstones have been destroyed. In some cases whole graveyards completely decimated. A recent article in The Telegraph shows the destruction of the soldiers headstones .
Report by Colin Freeman: The Telegraph November 13 2013 reports: (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/britain-at-war/10438147/Iraq-cemetery-containing-graves-of-British-servicemen-is-destroyed.html)
A First and Second World War cemetery in Basra has been destroyed by vandals and looters. A cemetery in Iraq that contains the graves of thousands of British servicemen who died in the two World Wars has been completely destroyed.
The Basra war cemetery is one of several around southern Iraq that date back to the British Mesopotamian campaign of 1914
The graveyard in Basra has been left without a single one of its 4,000 headstones still standing after repeated vandalism and looting in the years since the fall of Saddam Hussein.
When British troops first took control of the city in 2003, wreaths were laid at the cemetery on Remembrance Sunday for the first time in decades.
Some soldiers even honoured the graves of relatives who had died in action during the Mesopotamian campaign of World War One.
But the growing insurgent threat soon made it impractical for British forces to protect it, and after their withdrawal from the city in 2007, it was too dangerous for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission to send teams to repair the damage.
It is not the name engraved on Portland Stone that make us remember our fallen heroes, it is the names engraved upon our hearts and in the stories handed down, in our history, in our pride, in continuing the story of who we are and the peace and freedom for which we fought. It is in honouring our dead that we remember, Let us remember well.
John Ferguson had the honour of bearing his father's name. His mother Julia Moylan and siblings James, Catherine, Mary Anne and Ellen lived at 122.1 Great Georges Street, Belfast per 1901 Census. The home was shared with other relatives. Granda John Moylan and his Uncles Pat and Eddie, Aunt Mary and Cousin Peter, so it was a pretty full household for John who was then a 2 year old toddler.
The census lent important facts to the life of young John Ferguson and establish his age as 2 years old in 1901. His sister Ellen had not yet been born. Sister Julia born in 1891 was deceased. His father died in 1901 at the Union Infirmary and he is buried in public ground at the City Cemetery. His older brother James was also deceased by 1911. This meant some drastic changes in young John's life as the family he was so used to living with would break up and find other places to live. His mother and siblings moved to 10 Great Georges Street and he resided there until the death of his mother in 1915. John's sister Catherine stepped into the parenting role for the family. Mary Anne had married in 1914 to Charles Neeson also a Connaught Ranger #2550. Perhaps these circumstances motivated John to grow up to quickly, to look to make his own way in the world, to become a man. What makes a boy a man quicker than war?
John enlisted in the 6th Connaught Rangers at Fermoy, County Cork on 16 July 1915 under the false information that he was then 19 years old, using 1896 as his year of birth. He was in fact a boy of barely 16 years. This is supported by both 1901 and 1911 census.
Prior to enlisting he was an assistant postman and the family – consisting of Sisters Catherine, Sarah and Ellen had moved to 12 McCleery Street. Sister Mary Anne would move into the home with her sisters when as a new mother to baby daughter Julia her husband Charles Neeson would also be in France fighting the war with the 6th Connaught Rangers (KIA October 11 1918).
John is described as being 5' 4-3/4", 114lbs, 36-1/2" chest, in good health and with no identifying marks.
John spent 5 months training in Fermoy before moving to Blackdown, England in September of 1915. He suffered with Impetigo and was hospitalized 27 November – 03 December 1915 just prior to being shipped to France on 17 December 1915 as part of the British Expeditionary Forces. He would experience the war first hand with The Battle of the Somme at Guillemont and Ginchy were the 6th took heavy losses.
John suffered gas poisoning July 1 1916 on the first day of the Battle of the Somme – termed "Gas Drift". He was taken on the H.S. Dieppe to London General Hospital, England to receive treatment for the effects of the gas from 9th July to 19 July 1916. He was posted to the 4th Connaught Rangers 03 August 1916. Between discharge from hospital and posting to the 4th CR's, John was deducted 5 days' pay "for his keep". On October 20 1916 John was again transferred, this time to the 1st Connaught Rangers as part of the Indian Expeditionary Force (IEP). He returned to action disembarking in Basra on 16 December 1916. He was again admitted to field hospital January 15 1917 cause is listed as NYD (Not Yet Determined – possibly heat related). He suffered arm and neck injuries 26 January 1917 and was hospitalized again until 9 February 1917. Once more John became ill this time with Diphtheria requiring more hospitalization from 1-21 March 1917, returning again to his unit on discharge.
In addition to battling the enemy the IEF soldiers faced heat related illnesses, many succumbing to heat stroke. They were hungry and even thirsty as the Turkish prevented their supply ships from getting through. On top of that they dealt with mosquitos and a cholera outbreak; all while fighting battles at Kut 23 February 1917, Fall of Bagdad on 11 March 1917, Samarrah Offensive - March 13-April 23 1917, Conquered Fallujah March 19 1917, and taking the Town of Samarrah and its railroad on April 23 1917.
On 11 July 1917 John was part of the Field Infantry at Makina Masus. The British column from Feluja (Euphrates) engaged with Turkish forces up the river. The Turks inflicted considerable loss on the British. (Mesopotamia Campaign). Unfortunately John was critically injured in this battle. His records do not state the actual wounds sustained only that he died from them the same day - 11 July 1917. (Nb: some names spelt differently in WW1 records - Faluja/Fallujah, Mesopotamia is now Iraq)
Pte. Fergusons' final medical report would state "Soldier – Non Effective" – "Dying of Wounds".
John was buried at Dialeh (Diyala) Cemetery 12 miles S.E. of Bagdad and his body was later exhumed for reburial with military honours at Dhibban Cemetery on Euphrates, 8 miles West by North of Fallujah, Mesopotamia. Plot: 68.1, N. 1881/A.
Soldiers who died in WW1 fighting with British Forces received a letter of condolence from King George V. This was accompanied by a Memorial Scroll and Plaque which the soldiers promptly nicknamed the "Death Penny". This was in keeping with the Greek Mythology that one had to pay their passage to the afterlife and the resemblance of the plaque to the large English Penny.
These items were mailed to the next of kin in a brown cardboard package throughout 1920 and many found the "Penny" to be offensive to the lives of their lost loved ones in that their lives were attributed to the value of a penny. Many people returned the "plaques' for this reason.
Catherine Ferguson Reid received one final thing from the War Office – John's final salary, a total amount of three shillings and sixpence or 3/6-.
The Dead Man's Penny:
The history of the Dead Man's Penny began in 1916 with the realization by the British Government that some form of an official token of gratitude should be given to the fallen service men and women's bereaved next of kin. The enormous casualty figures not anticipated at the start of WWI back in 1914 prompted this gesture of recognition. In 1917, the government announced a competition to design a suitable plaque with a prize of 250 pounds.
There were 800 entries from all over the Empire, the Dominions, and even from the troops on the Western Front. Mr. E. Carter Preston of Liverpool, England, was the eventual winner. Mr. Carter's initials are included in the design of the penny just above the lion's right forepaw.
The selected design was a 12-centimetre disk cast in bronze gunmetal, which incorporated the following; an image of Britannia and a lion, two dolphins representing Britain's sea power and the emblem of Imperial Germany's eagle being torn to pieces by another lion. Britannia is holding an oak spray with leaves and acorns. Beneath this was a rectangular tablet where the deceased individual's name was cast into the plaque. No rank was given as it was intended to show equality in their sacrifice. On the outer edge of the disk, the words, ‘He died for freedom and honour'. The Plaques were manufactured at old armament factories.
So why are they called Dead Man's Penny? Ancient Greek and Roman mythology is that the River Styx forms the boundary between Earth and the Underworld. A ferryman, Charon, would ferry the souls of the newly dead across the river if they were able to pay the toll. To ensure the toll was available relatives would bury a body with a coin in the mouth. The design of the memorial plaque is similar to the penny coin of 1918 and associated with the death of servicemen and women; leading the soldiers to give it the nickname, Dead Man's Penny.
MEDALS AWARDED - Service WW1:
The 1914-15 British Star was a campaign medal awarded for service in WW1. It was approved in 1918 for issue to officers and men of the British and Imperial Forces who served in any theatre of the War between August 5 1914 and 31 December 1915. (Other than those who had already received the 1914 Star). Also issued was the British War Medal and the Victory Medal. These medals were ‘irreverently referred to as Pip (British Star), Squeak (British War Medal) and Wilfred (Victory Medal).
The medals were sent to John's sister Catherine Ferguson Reid at their home address in 1920. Many of the families returned the medals to the war office in protest of the treatment of the Irish during the 1916 Easter Rising, The Indian Mutiny and the lost ‘promise' of the British Government to grant Home Rule which was used as a recruitment strategy to ‘encourage' Irish men to fight for the British Forces during WW1.
AFTER THE WAR:
The freedom Pte. John Ferguson fought for, would not be one he lived to enjoy. His sisters continued to live at 12 McCleery Street, Mary Anne and Sarah Jane working in Gallagher's Cigarette Factory as Tobacco Spinners and Catherine keeping home.
The H.S. Dieppe once a steam passenger ship had been requisitioned by the navy during WW1 and converted to a hospital ship. On 27 February 1916 she took aboard over 100 survivors from the passenger liner Maloja which was sunk by a mine off Dover. The ship was returned to its owners after the war and was sold in 1933 to W.E. Guinness (1st Baron of Moyne); who turned it into his personal yacht. She was renamed Rosaura. It is said this is the ship where Wallace Simpson fell in love with the Prince of Wales while taking a cruise on the Rosaura in August 1934.
The Rosaura was again requisitioned during WW2 for use as an armed boarding vessel in Contraband Control. It was involved in Operation Abstention (code name given to the British invasion of the Italian island of Kastelorizo. The ship struck a mine off Tobruk on 18 March 1941 and sank, claiming the lives of 78 people.
In 1914, Baghdad was the headquarters of the Turkish Army in Mesopotamia. It was the ultimate objective of the Indian Expeditionary Force 'D' and the goal of the force besieged and captured at Kut in 1916. The city finally fell in March 1917, but the position was not fully consolidated until the end of April. Nevertheless, it had by that time become the Expeditionary Force's advanced base, with two stationary hospitals and three casualty clearing stations.
The North Gate Cemetery was begun In April 1917 and has been greatly enlarged since the end of the First World War by graves brought in from other burial grounds in Baghdad and northern Iraq, and from battlefields and cemeteries in Anatolia where Commonwealth prisoners of war were buried by the Turks. At present, 4,160 Commonwealth casualties of the First World War are commemorated by name in the cemetery, many of them on special memorials. Unidentified burials from this period number 2,729.
The cemetery also contains the grave of Lieutenant General Sir Stanley Maude, Commander-in-Chief of the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force, who died at Baghdad in November 1917 and the memorial to the 13th Division which he commanded. A memorial to the 6th Battalion Loyal (North Lancashire) Regiment was brought into the cemetery from the banks of the Diyala River in 1947. (Courtesy of Commonwealth War Graves Commission).
Due to the political instability of the region it is no longer possible to maintain the War Cemeteries in this area and many of the headstones have been destroyed. In some cases whole graveyards completely decimated. A recent article in The Telegraph shows the destruction of the soldiers headstones .
Report by Colin Freeman: The Telegraph November 13 2013 reports: (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/britain-at-war/10438147/Iraq-cemetery-containing-graves-of-British-servicemen-is-destroyed.html)
A First and Second World War cemetery in Basra has been destroyed by vandals and looters. A cemetery in Iraq that contains the graves of thousands of British servicemen who died in the two World Wars has been completely destroyed.
The Basra war cemetery is one of several around southern Iraq that date back to the British Mesopotamian campaign of 1914
The graveyard in Basra has been left without a single one of its 4,000 headstones still standing after repeated vandalism and looting in the years since the fall of Saddam Hussein.
When British troops first took control of the city in 2003, wreaths were laid at the cemetery on Remembrance Sunday for the first time in decades.
Some soldiers even honoured the graves of relatives who had died in action during the Mesopotamian campaign of World War One.
But the growing insurgent threat soon made it impractical for British forces to protect it, and after their withdrawal from the city in 2007, it was too dangerous for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission to send teams to repair the damage.
It is not the name engraved on Portland Stone that make us remember our fallen heroes, it is the names engraved upon our hearts and in the stories handed down, in our history, in our pride, in continuing the story of who we are and the peace and freedom for which we fought. It is in honouring our dead that we remember, Let us remember well.
The census lent important facts to the life of young John Ferguson and establish his age as 2 years old in 1901. His sister Ellen had not yet been born. Sister Julia born in 1891 was deceased. His father died in 1901 at the Union Infirmary and he is buried in public ground at the City Cemetery. His older brother James was also deceased by 1911. This meant some drastic changes in young John's life as the family he was so used to living with would break up and find other places to live. His mother and siblings moved to 10 Great Georges Street and he resided there until the death of his mother in 1915. John's sister Catherine stepped into the parenting role for the family. Mary Anne had married in 1914 to Charles Neeson also a Connaught Ranger #2550. Perhaps these circumstances motivated John to grow up to quickly, to look to make his own way in the world, to become a man. What makes a boy a man quicker than war?
John enlisted in the 6th Connaught Rangers at Fermoy, County Cork on 16 July 1915 under the false information that he was then 19 years old, using 1896 as his year of birth. He was in fact a boy of barely 16 years. This is supported by both 1901 and 1911 census.
Prior to enlisting he was an assistant postman and the family – consisting of Sisters Catherine, Sarah and Ellen had moved to 12 McCleery Street. Sister Mary Anne would move into the home with her sisters when as a new mother to baby daughter Julia her husband Charles Neeson would also be in France fighting the war with the 6th Connaught Rangers (KIA October 11 1918).
John is described as being 5' 4-3/4", 114lbs, 36-1/2" chest, in good health and with no identifying marks.
John spent 5 months training in Fermoy before moving to Blackdown, England in September of 1915. He suffered with Impetigo and was hospitalized 27 November – 03 December 1915 just prior to being shipped to France on 17 December 1915 as part of the British Expeditionary Forces. He would experience the war first hand with The Battle of the Somme at Guillemont and Ginchy were the 6th took heavy losses.
John suffered gas poisoning July 1 1916 on the first day of the Battle of the Somme – termed "Gas Drift". He was taken on the H.S. Dieppe to London General Hospital, England to receive treatment for the effects of the gas from 9th July to 19 July 1916. He was posted to the 4th Connaught Rangers 03 August 1916. Between discharge from hospital and posting to the 4th CR's, John was deducted 5 days' pay "for his keep". On October 20 1916 John was again transferred, this time to the 1st Connaught Rangers as part of the Indian Expeditionary Force (IEP). He returned to action disembarking in Basra on 16 December 1916. He was again admitted to field hospital January 15 1917 cause is listed as NYD (Not Yet Determined – possibly heat related). He suffered arm and neck injuries 26 January 1917 and was hospitalized again until 9 February 1917. Once more John became ill this time with Diphtheria requiring more hospitalization from 1-21 March 1917, returning again to his unit on discharge.
In addition to battling the enemy the IEF soldiers faced heat related illnesses, many succumbing to heat stroke. They were hungry and even thirsty as the Turkish prevented their supply ships from getting through. On top of that they dealt with mosquitos and a cholera outbreak; all while fighting battles at Kut 23 February 1917, Fall of Bagdad on 11 March 1917, Samarrah Offensive - March 13-April 23 1917, Conquered Fallujah March 19 1917, and taking the Town of Samarrah and its railroad on April 23 1917.
On 11 July 1917 John was part of the Field Infantry at Makina Masus. The British column from Feluja (Euphrates) engaged with Turkish forces up the river. The Turks inflicted considerable loss on the British. (Mesopotamia Campaign). Unfortunately John was critically injured in this battle. His records do not state the actual wounds sustained only that he died from them the same day - 11 July 1917. (Nb: some names spelt differently in WW1 records - Faluja/Fallujah, Mesopotamia is now Iraq)
Pte. Fergusons' final medical report would state "Soldier – Non Effective" – "Dying of Wounds".
John was buried at Dialeh (Diyala) Cemetery 12 miles S.E. of Bagdad and his body was later exhumed for reburial with military honours at Dhibban Cemetery on Euphrates, 8 miles West by North of Fallujah, Mesopotamia. Plot: 68.1, N. 1881/A.
Soldiers who died in WW1 fighting with British Forces received a letter of condolence from King George V. This was accompanied by a Memorial Scroll and Plaque which the soldiers promptly nicknamed the "Death Penny". This was in keeping with the Greek Mythology that one had to pay their passage to the afterlife and the resemblance of the plaque to the large English Penny.
These items were mailed to the next of kin in a brown cardboard package throughout 1920 and many found the "Penny" to be offensive to the lives of their lost loved ones in that their lives were attributed to the value of a penny. Many people returned the "plaques' for this reason.
Catherine Ferguson Reid received one final thing from the War Office – John's final salary, a total amount of three shillings and sixpence or 3/6-.
The Dead Man's Penny:
The history of the Dead Man's Penny began in 1916 with the realization by the British Government that some form of an official token of gratitude should be given to the fallen service men and women's bereaved next of kin. The enormous casualty figures not anticipated at the start of WWI back in 1914 prompted this gesture of recognition. In 1917, the government announced a competition to design a suitable plaque with a prize of 250 pounds.
There were 800 entries from all over the Empire, the Dominions, and even from the troops on the Western Front. Mr. E. Carter Preston of Liverpool, England, was the eventual winner. Mr. Carter's initials are included in the design of the penny just above the lion's right forepaw.
The selected design was a 12-centimetre disk cast in bronze gunmetal, which incorporated the following; an image of Britannia and a lion, two dolphins representing Britain's sea power and the emblem of Imperial Germany's eagle being torn to pieces by another lion. Britannia is holding an oak spray with leaves and acorns. Beneath this was a rectangular tablet where the deceased individual's name was cast into the plaque. No rank was given as it was intended to show equality in their sacrifice. On the outer edge of the disk, the words, ‘He died for freedom and honour'. The Plaques were manufactured at old armament factories.
So why are they called Dead Man's Penny? Ancient Greek and Roman mythology is that the River Styx forms the boundary between Earth and the Underworld. A ferryman, Charon, would ferry the souls of the newly dead across the river if they were able to pay the toll. To ensure the toll was available relatives would bury a body with a coin in the mouth. The design of the memorial plaque is similar to the penny coin of 1918 and associated with the death of servicemen and women; leading the soldiers to give it the nickname, Dead Man's Penny.
MEDALS AWARDED - Service WW1:
The 1914-15 British Star was a campaign medal awarded for service in WW1. It was approved in 1918 for issue to officers and men of the British and Imperial Forces who served in any theatre of the War between August 5 1914 and 31 December 1915. (Other than those who had already received the 1914 Star). Also issued was the British War Medal and the Victory Medal. These medals were ‘irreverently referred to as Pip (British Star), Squeak (British War Medal) and Wilfred (Victory Medal).
The medals were sent to John's sister Catherine Ferguson Reid at their home address in 1920. Many of the families returned the medals to the war office in protest of the treatment of the Irish during the 1916 Easter Rising, The Indian Mutiny and the lost ‘promise' of the British Government to grant Home Rule which was used as a recruitment strategy to ‘encourage' Irish men to fight for the British Forces during WW1.
AFTER THE WAR:
The freedom Pte. John Ferguson fought for, would not be one he lived to enjoy. His sisters continued to live at 12 McCleery Street, Mary Anne and Sarah Jane working in Gallagher's Cigarette Factory as Tobacco Spinners and Catherine keeping home.
The H.S. Dieppe once a steam passenger ship had been requisitioned by the navy during WW1 and converted to a hospital ship. On 27 February 1916 she took aboard over 100 survivors from the passenger liner Maloja which was sunk by a mine off Dover. The ship was returned to its owners after the war and was sold in 1933 to W.E. Guinness (1st Baron of Moyne); who turned it into his personal yacht. She was renamed Rosaura. It is said this is the ship where Wallace Simpson fell in love with the Prince of Wales while taking a cruise on the Rosaura in August 1934.
The Rosaura was again requisitioned during WW2 for use as an armed boarding vessel in Contraband Control. It was involved in Operation Abstention (code name given to the British invasion of the Italian island of Kastelorizo. The ship struck a mine off Tobruk on 18 March 1941 and sank, claiming the lives of 78 people.
In 1914, Baghdad was the headquarters of the Turkish Army in Mesopotamia. It was the ultimate objective of the Indian Expeditionary Force 'D' and the goal of the force besieged and captured at Kut in 1916. The city finally fell in March 1917, but the position was not fully consolidated until the end of April. Nevertheless, it had by that time become the Expeditionary Force's advanced base, with two stationary hospitals and three casualty clearing stations.
The North Gate Cemetery was begun In April 1917 and has been greatly enlarged since the end of the First World War by graves brought in from other burial grounds in Baghdad and northern Iraq, and from battlefields and cemeteries in Anatolia where Commonwealth prisoners of war were buried by the Turks. At present, 4,160 Commonwealth casualties of the First World War are commemorated by name in the cemetery, many of them on special memorials. Unidentified burials from this period number 2,729.
The cemetery also contains the grave of Lieutenant General Sir Stanley Maude, Commander-in-Chief of the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force, who died at Baghdad in November 1917 and the memorial to the 13th Division which he commanded. A memorial to the 6th Battalion Loyal (North Lancashire) Regiment was brought into the cemetery from the banks of the Diyala River in 1947. (Courtesy of Commonwealth War Graves Commission).
Due to the political instability of the region it is no longer possible to maintain the War Cemeteries in this area and many of the headstones have been destroyed. In some cases whole graveyards completely decimated. A recent article in The Telegraph shows the destruction of the soldiers headstones .
Report by Colin Freeman: The Telegraph November 13 2013 reports: (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/britain-at-war/10438147/Iraq-cemetery-containing-graves-of-British-servicemen-is-destroyed.html)
A First and Second World War cemetery in Basra has been destroyed by vandals and looters. A cemetery in Iraq that contains the graves of thousands of British servicemen who died in the two World Wars has been completely destroyed.
The Basra war cemetery is one of several around southern Iraq that date back to the British Mesopotamian campaign of 1914
The graveyard in Basra has been left without a single one of its 4,000 headstones still standing after repeated vandalism and looting in the years since the fall of Saddam Hussein.
When British troops first took control of the city in 2003, wreaths were laid at the cemetery on Remembrance Sunday for the first time in decades.
Some soldiers even honoured the graves of relatives who had died in action during the Mesopotamian campaign of World War One.
But the growing insurgent threat soon made it impractical for British forces to protect it, and after their withdrawal from the city in 2007, it was too dangerous for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission to send teams to repair the damage.
It is not the name engraved on Portland Stone that make us remember our fallen heroes, it is the names engraved upon our hearts and in the stories handed down, in our history, in our pride, in continuing the story of who we are and the peace and freedom for which we fought. It is in honouring our dead that we remember, Let us remember well.
Inscription
Connaught Rangers
Gravesite Details
33329 (6th Battalion Connaught Ranger #4591)
