Private Andrew Paxton

Private Andrew Paxton, ” A”Coy. 7th/8th ( Service ) Battalion, Kings Own Scottish Borderers. He was killed in France, aged 21, in the Martinpuich sector on 18th August 1916 in the fight for” Intermediate” and” Switch” trenches during the Battle of the Somme. He had been born in Swinton, Berwickshire and  was the son of Andrew Paxton of Hillside, Chirnside and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial for the Missing of the Somme battles. A bursting shell had buried him and no trace of his body was ever found. He had enlisted in 1915 and is also commemorated on the Swinton War Memorial. Before enlisting in Berwick he had worked as a ploughman at Mountfair farm. The photos show Scottish troops on the Somme and the colour image depicts the peaceful Somme today with ” no gas, no barbed wire, no guns firing now”.