GlesgaPals 'oor Forces' 5b HLI

Private David Stewart Burnett 16th (Glasgow Boys Brigade) Battalion of the Highland Light Infantry.
Born 15 May 1894, died 101 yrs old.
Seen here with Glesga Pal Charlie McDonald.

Charlie told me "Auld Davie was married three times and loved the wummen ...he was last married at the age of 86. Born and bred in David Street in Mile End he was a mine of information about Camalachie and district an out and out gentleman was oor Davie - I buried his ashes in besides his brother and his two pals on the Somme."
Davie shared the same birthday as Charlie, the day Charlie was born Davie retired at the age of sixty from his job as an insurance inspector with the Prudential.

Cap Badge

Highland Light Infantry

As worn on the Glengarry and Tam-O-Shanter

Private John Keiller 17th (Glasgow Commercials) Battalion of the Highland Light Infantry. Died age 104

Charlie said "Two men whom I knew and interviewed and befriended and they never once question the reason's why the went to war but saw it as their duty to Fight For Their King and Country and most importantly their comrades in arms in their Regiment and Battalion. Politicians start wars soldiers finish them."

Private Peter Kelly,
16th HLI Age 23, Born Glasgow Scotland,
Killed at the Battle of the Somme on July 1, 1916.

Peter Kelly was in the 16th Highlander Light Infantry. He was from Glasgow, Scotland. He joined the army sometime in 1914 or 1915 and served until he was killed on July 1, 1916 at the battle of the Somme. Peter was one of those that no grave could be given since there was nothing left of him to bury, according to his friend Neil McDonald.
Peter Kelly was survived by his wife Mary Catteral Kelly, and his young son Andrew Kelly
I am his granddaughter, Carol Bell

A Vision, Not a Dream
song written by Nick Griffin on 1st July 2004 –
the anniversary of the start of the Battle of the Somme

Last night as I looked at my young lad I thought how he had grown,
To be as fine as lads will be Muscle and laughter and bone.
Then I thought of the Fields of Flanders And as the eve turned black,
I thought of the lads ’neath the poppies - The boys who never came back.

I remembered my grandfather telling me When I was just that age,
Of his youth lost in the trenches, And how he hated Haig
And all of the fools and profiteers Who doomed his pals to die,
And cut down the Flower of Europe For the sake of Gold and a lie.

Then I slept, and the darkness it lifted And I smiled, as in a dream
I caught a glimpse of the future, In twenty and sixteen:
One hundred years after the madness Of guns, barbed wire and bombs,
I saw the young heroes of Europe, Gather once more on the Somme.

I saw them, heads bowed, ’mid the gravestones Of my grandfather’s pals – and their foe;
And I knew that the horror was ended, The madness that laid our Race low.
And all the young sons of our peoples – Nations once marked as Cain,
I watched them all swear that the White Man Would not slay his brothers again.

I saw them go forth together, Saw them fight side by side,
To rid all our lands of the menace Unleashed by greed and lies.
And Europe, from Ireland to Russia, Was ours, at peace, and clean.
And I knew I’d seen into the future – A vision, and not just a dream!
.

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