Private Charles Borthwick Johnson

Priavte Charles Borthwick Johnson, 22nd ( 3rd Tyneside Scottish ) Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers. He was killed in action in France on 1st July, 1916 on the first day of the Battle of the Somme and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France. He was born at Berwick-on-Tweed and enlisted at Newcastle-upon-Tyne. He fell in the attack on La Boiselle which gained only some of the German trenches and cost the Battalion very heavily with 8 Officers and 198 Other Ranks killed and 14 Officers and 319 Other Ranks wounded.  No Officer survived unscathed. In total that day cost the four Battalions of the Tyneside Scottish 2,288 casualties in killed and wounded. The contemporary  photograph shows the Tyneside Irish in perfect order advancing towards La Boiselle at 7.30 a.m. over a wide no mans land with little cover. The colour image shows a peaceful Somme landscape today with” no gas, no barbed wire, no guns firing now”.