My great uncle George Chapman was 30 when he was killed. He had previously emigrated from his home town Newcastle upon Tyne and set up as a brick layer in Toronto, Canada. He was doing well, he had a wife Mary and a motor car. I don’t know if he had any children.  After war was declared he joined the 42nd. battalion of the Highland regiment of the Canadian Expeditionary Force. He transferred to the engineers after three weeks since he didn’t like wearing the kilt. I’m remembering this from 80 years ago, but my grandmother, his sister, said he wouldn’t go up the stairs on the tram. Family tradition has it he survived the battle of the Somme. He spent his leave thereafter with his sister Mary Anderson my grandmother in Newcastle. As he left to return to the front, he took off his wrist watch and handed it to my father, aged then 13, and said ‘here you are Tom, I don’t think I shall be needing this much longer.’ He was killed 5 months later. I have the watch still and would like to return it to any of his more immediate family. My grandmother had a lasting sense of loss.

The photograph was taken in the summer of 1915, when briefly he served with the Canadian Highland regiment.

Ian Anderson