Lachlan Henry Veitch Fraser
4th Battalion, Middlesex Regiment
Died 24 February 1915 age 20
Lieut. L.H.V. Fraser – Middlx. Regt.
Lachlan Henry Veitch Fraser was the youngest son of Major Francis and Alexia Mary Beatrice de Dombal Fraser of Tornaveen, Torphins. He was born at Tornaveen on 22 April 1894, the fourth of five children, having two older brothers, one older sister and one younger.
He attended school first at St Helens College, Southsea, then (from 1908) at Malvern College, where he was a member of the OTC. He was registered at 8 The College, Malvern in the census of 1911. We know a lot about the young Lachlan from his form of application for a cadetship in the Royal Military College in December 1912. His headmaster, giving a somewhat tentative reference, told the army “He has considerable force of character…He is somewhat thoughtless and impetuous, but shows courage and dash…A fine football player… This boy has plenty of life and go about him & will make a good soldier but I should think he may not be exactly easy to manage…I recommend this boy because I believe that he will come on well, but of course that is rather a matter of instinct than of knowledge on my part”. He further advised: “He comes of a fighting stock”.
Indeed he did. His form gives particulars: great grandfather Francis Fraser, a Captain in the Royal Navy, great uncle Col. R. Winchester of the Gordon Highlanders who fought in the Peninsular War and at Waterloo, grandfather Capt. Henderson Macdonald of the 78th Highlanders who served in Persia; a great uncle who served in the Crimea and another in the Baltic; father a Major in the 3rd East Yorkshire Regiment; brothers Francis in the Seaforths and Douglas in the 3rd Gordon Highlanders; cousins the Hon. R. Robertson and Oliver Haig, who had both been in the South African campaign; another cousin Capt. A.W. Robertson-Glasgow of the Garhwal Rifles, who was also a brother-in-law married to his older sister Violet, and finally cousin Lt. Gen. Sir Douglas Haig, later Commander-in-Chief of the Expeditionary Forces in France and Flanders.
Fraser succeeded in his application to the Royal Military College at Sandhurst. He embarked for France in September 1914 as part of the British Expeditionary Force, was promoted to the rank of temporary Lieutenant in the 4th Battalion, Duke of Cambridge’s Own (Middlesex Regiment) on 15 November and became a Lieutenant on 1 January 1915. He was Mentioned in Despatches for gallant and distinguished service in the field, only a week before being killed in action at Ypres on 24 February 1915, a few weeks short of his 21stbirthday.
The 4th Middlesex had relieved the 2nd Bn Royal Scots in the trenches on 22 February. On 23 February they sent upThe battalion were not engaged in any particular action on 24 February, when the War Diary entry reads as follows:
“Nothing happened during the day. Lieutenant (Temporary) L. H. V. Fraser and 3 men killed and 4 men wounded during the evening. A Company was relieved by B Company , C Company by D Company. There was a bright moonlight (sic) and 5 of the casualties occurred during this relief. There was a heavy bombardment on our left all day and heavy rifle fire all night but our front was fairly quiet. The Brigade Major went round all our trenches in the evening and suggested the building up of another row of sandbags all along our line. This was immediately taken in hand”.
A note in the margin of the diary at this point reads: “During this tour of duty in the trenches, the Germans had a trench mortar shelling along our M section every night but it did very little damage only cutting the wire in places”.
A telegram to Major Fraser at Tornaveen on 26 February from the War Office carried the news: “Deeply regret to inform you that Lieut. L.H.V. Fraser 4 Middlesex Regt was killed in action 24 February. Lord Kitchener expresses his sympathy”. Press reports at the time noted that Fraser’s commanding officer described him as “a universal favourite in his regiment and did not know what fear was” and that he was killed instantaneously.
In April 1915, the Malvernian printed an obituary: “Naturally brave and regardless of risks he was well qualified for the work which our officers have been called upon to perform in the war”. It quoted a fellow officer who wrote of him that the men would have done anything for him or have gone anywhere.
Lachlan Fraser was buried at Godezonne Farm Cemetery. Mrs Fraser took up correspondence with the War Office regarding her son’s missing effects – his sword, revolver and pocket book. In August that year at least two other children of the family were in France: older brother Francis, who earned the Military Cross, and went on to train for the new-fangled Royal Flying Corps, and younger sister Carey then aged 19 and at Dinan, whose later war service in France with the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry earned her the Croix de Guerre and Légion d’Honneur in 1918. Both survived the war. Francis went on to serve in World War II.
Sources
Commonwealth War Graves Commission
Soldiers Died in the Great War
Census Scotland 1891 and 1901
Census England & Wales 1911
National Archives – Officers File WO339/11152; 4th Bn War Diary WO95/1422/2_1
Aberdeen Evening Express 27 February 1915: “TORPHINS All in this district are greatly pleased to learn of the high honour won by Lieutenant L. H. V. Fraser of the 4th Battalion Middlesex regiment, son of Major Francis Fraser of Tornaveen, who was mentioned in Sir John French’s latest dispatch. This, together with his rapid promotion, is very gratifying”.
Aberdeen Evening Express 4 March 1915
Aberdeen Press & Journal 5 March 1915
Dundee Evening Telegraph 5 March 1915
Malvern College Roll of Honour
Imperial War Museum obituary
De Ruvigny’s Roll of Honour 1914-1924
