Lance Corporal John Hettle

Lance Corporal John Binnie Hettle, 15th ( Service ) Battalion, Royal Scots. He was killed in action in France on 30th July 1916 during the Battle of the Somme and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial, Thiepval, Somme, France. He fell in the very severe fighting which took place in the vicinity of ” High Wood ” and its attempted capture. This was a sector defended fanatically by the Germans and was not captured until mid September 1916. It is estimated 8,000 men, British and German died in the fighting for this place of ill renown. The photos show troops on the Somme and the colour image shows a peaxceful Somme landscape today with” no gas, no barbed wire, no guns firing now”.