Father loses both his sons to war
A Bannockburn Military Medallist was among the Stirling area men to be killed in action during the latest German offensive.
Sgt John Fleming Stewart, Scottish Rifles, fell on April 13, 1918.
He was the eldest son of miner Mr Alexander Stewart, The Royal George, Bannockburn.
Sgt Fleming, who was 22 and a native of Blantyre, went to work at Cowie Colliery in 1913 when his parents moved from Hamilton district to Bannockburn.
A member of the Hamilton Territorials (1-6th Scottish Rifles), he was mobilised with his unit when war broke out.
In three years in France, he was twice Mentioned in Despatches and awarded the Military Medal. He was also recommended for a commission.
The deceased’s father was a former member of the A&SH who enlisted in the regiment in 1882. He left after seven years but rejoined as a reservist when the South African War broke out and fought through that campaign.
He re-enlisted again in October, 1914, in the 11th A&SH but contracted pleurisy and was discharged.
With the death of Sgt Stewart, Mr Stewart had lost both of his sons to the 1914-18 conflict. His younger son Alexander, a private in the A&SH (Kitchener’s Army), who enlisted at the age of 17, was killed on September 26, 1915, in France. The day before, at the same place, an uncle was killed in action.
•Another Military Medallist to die from wounds sustained in action was L/Cpl Robert Stewart, A&SH. He was the younger son of brushmaker Mr Thomas Stewart, and Mrs Stewart, 87 Lower Bridge Street, Stirling , and was 17 when he enlisted in November, 1914.
L/Cpl Stewart was severely wounded on April 12 , 1918, and died two days later in a base hospital in France just weeks before his 21st birthday. He went to France with the Territorial Battalion of the Argylls in 1915 and distinguished himself in much of the fighting in which the regiment took part.
The lance-corporal was in autumn, 1917, awarded the Military Medal for gallantry in leading his platoon in an attack on the enemy but was later wounded at the Battle of the Somme in July, 1916,
L/Cpl Stewart was an apprentice fitter in the locomotive department of the Caledonian Railway Company and was the first railwayman from Stirling to gain the Military Medal. His former work colleagues presented him with a watch to mark his bravery during a home visit in February, 1918.
He was also a former member of Castlehill Boys’ Brigade and a prominent player in Juvenile West End Football Club formed by lads connected to the company, nearly all of whom voluntarily enlisted at the start of the war.