Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

An important Great War Serbian St. Karageorge group of six awarded to Lieutenant-Colonel A. J. Welch, King’s Own Scottish Borderers, a Gallipoli veteran who was twice wounded and who commanded his regiment’s 1st Battalion on the First Day of the Somme

India General Service 1895-1902, 3 clasps, Relief of Chitral 1895, Punjab Frontier 1897-98, Tirah 1897-98 (2nd Lieutt., 2nd Bn. K.O. Sco. Bord.); Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 3 clasps, Cape Colony, Paardeberg, Johannesburg (Capt., K.O. Sco. Bdrs.); 1914-15 Star (Major, K.O. Sco. Bord.); British War and Victory Medals, M.I.D. oak leaf (Lt. Col.); Serbian Order of Karageorge, 4th class breast badge, with swords, silver, silver-gilt and enamels, this last very slightly chipped in places and the first two with contact marks, otherwise generally very fine and better (6) £1200-1500

Alfred John Welch, who was born in July 1873, was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant into the King’s Own Scottish Borderers direct from the Militia in September 1893. Posted to the 2nd Battalion out in India, he was subsequently employed in the relief of Chitral operations of 1895, and afterwards, as a recently promoted Lieutenant, in the Tirah Expeditionary Force’s operations on the Punjab Frontier 1897-98, including his Battalion’s part in the first storming of the Dargai Heights. He was awarded the Medal and three clasps.

During the Boer War, Welch served as a Captain in the operations in the Orange Free State from February to May 1900, when he was present at the actions at Paardeberg (17 and 26 February), Poplar Grove and Karee Siding. And afterwards, in the Transvaal, in the period May to June 1900, when he fought at the actions near Johannesburg and Pretoria, and in the latter half of the year, in the engagement at Zilikat’s Nek. He remained similarly employed in the Transvaal until May 1902, and was awarded the Queen’s Medal with three clasps.

By the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, Welch was a substantive Major in the 1st Battalion, and in the closing months of that year he served in Egypt and at Shaik Sa’id in South-West Arabia. But it was his subsequent part in the landings at ‘Y’ Beach, Gallipoli on 25 April 1915 that first gained him a place in the annals of the King’s Own Scottish Borderers’ distinguished history - indeed his own account of that famous occasion is frequently quoted in The K.O.S.B. in the Great War, by Captain Stair Gillon. Having landed at the head of ‘A’ Company - ‘to find that a complete surprise had been effected’ - Welch took his men up along the top of the cliff, where, to his dismay, he found the enemy entrenched in strength about 1200 yards inland from the beach. Soon afterwards, at 11 a.m., enemy field-guns opened the proceedings, and forced the Battalion’s assembled ranks to make a hasty line with their packs and entrenching tools, but as Welch later observed, ‘it never reached what could be called a trench, and was constructed under most harassing and ever-increasing rifle fire.’

Over the next 48 hours, in a grim series of close-quarter clashes that cost the Battalion nearly 300 men in killed or wounded, Welch acted as ‘O.C., Northern Sector of Defence’, on one occasion “telling off” a German officer who invited his force to retire - another who called out “You English surrender! We ten to one” was jumped by one of his soldiers, who ‘smashed his head’ with his entrenching tool. But the gallant stand made by the Battalion was in vain, for after just two days it was ordered back to the beach to be evacuated. Lieutenant-Commander Adrian Keyes, R.N., who was attached for duties ashore and witnessed much of the fighting, later wrote:

‘That any of us got away was due to the gallantry and heroism of the K.O.S.B. They were magnificent, and I can safely say that no other battalion had done anything finer in a day when nearly every man in the Division earned a V.C. ... It was quite the most gallant part of the landing the way the K.O.S.B. held on for those two days, and their final bayonet charges, though very little will ever be said about it, as they had to re-embark.’

Early on the 28 April 1915, the depleted Battalion was landed back on the Peninsula, this time at ‘W’ Beach, recently witness to the gallantry of the Lancashire Fusiliers. And within a matter of hours, Welch had to take command, when his immediate senior was seriously wounded. His task was to take Krithia, and with his men he closed to a point about 900 yards from their objective, ‘and could actually see into the village, not then occupied by hostile troops and therefore to be had for the asking’. But as a result of other units being pushed back on his flanks, the advantage could not be seized. A day or two later, while making his way to report to Brigade H.Q., Welch was felled by a shell burst, ‘rendering me a casualty and my participation in the Dardanelles campaign ended.’ He was mentioned in despatches (London Gazette 5 August 1915) and awarded the 4th class of the Serbian Order of Karageorge (London Gazette 15 February 1917).

On 19 May 1916, ‘just a year and seventeen days since his wound’, Welch assumed command of the 1st Battalion on the Somme, and on the eve of 1 July marched his men up to the front:

‘The Battalion presented a noble spectacle as it marched up from Acheux Wood on the night of 30 June. The bombardment had been going on since the 24th and there were some base corners and cross-roads to pass. The C.O. and the Chaplain were at the head of the column on foot. The marching was steady and slow, reminding me of the purposeful step of a mountain guide. The men had coats and all sorts of weighty equipment. There was a note of solemnity, something processional about these grave men on their way to victory or disaster. The Battalion had been praised for its good discipline by the G.O.C., who was not easily pleased or deceived.’



So read the final entry in the diary of Captain Shaw of ‘B’ Company, who like so many fellow officers and men of the 1st King’s Own Scottish Borderers, found an early grave in No Man’s Land a few hours later. In fact Welch’s new command was decimated as it advanced at Beaumont-Hamel on 1 July 1916, over 550 of his men falling victim to the enemy’s murderous machine-gun fire - in one company alone there were 202 casualties out of an original strength of 219 men. Such was the rapidity of the Battalion’s destruction, that ‘providentially H.Q. did not go forward beyond battle H.Q., and the framework for reconstruction was left.’ And so it was, Welch overseeing that ‘reconstruction’ and remaining in command of the Battalion until he, too, was evacuated through wounds received at the battle of Langemarck in August 1917, when he was badly burned when his forward H.Q. received a direct hit - the resultant explosion also killed 25 other ranks and wounded another five officers and 71 men:

‘The C.O’s wound was very painful, and he never returned to his battalion during the war, though he was able to do fine service in the 51st Division in the following year. But he could reflect as he lay in the hospital at Etaples that the plans he had elaborated with his trusty subordinates had succeeded brilliantly ... unquestionably Lieutenant-Colonel J. A. Welch was a great loss to the Battalion, Brigade and Division.’

In fact Welch’s final stint of service in France commenced with 51st Division in May 1918 and ended with his command of the 4th Battalion, King’s Own Scottish Borderers, from early August until early October of the same year.