Corporal Frank Pringle

Corporal Frank Lough Pringle, 1st/7th ( Territorial ) Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers. He was killed in action in France on 15th September 1916, aged 25, during the Battle of the Somme. He was the son of the late Mr and Mrs John Pringle of 20 Hide Hill, Berwick and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France. He fell in an attack on German positions west of Mametz Wood. The attack was only partially successful as it was enfiladed from the flanks by enemy machine guns and cost the Battalion 3 Officers and 114 Other Ranks killed with 7 Officers and 219 Other Ranks wounded. The first photograph shows the Memorial raised to the 50th ( Northumbrian ) Division of which the Battalion was part until February 1918 when it was transferred to the 42nd ( East Lancashire ) Division as the Pioneer Battalion.  It was erected near the village of Wieltje in the Ypres Salient where on 26th April 1915 the Division had fought its first action of the War nearby during the Second Battle of Ypres only five days after landing on the Continent. The other photos show troops during the Battle with the colour image depicting a peaceful Somme landscape today.