100 years ago, dur­ing the month of May 1915, Sikh sol­diers and of­fi­cers, par­tic­i­pat­ing in the fa­mous Bat­tle of Fes­tu­bert in France laid down their lives and won pro­fi­ciency medals. The au­thor has doggedly worked over the last decades to chron­i­cle the con­tri­bu­tion and par­tic­i­pa­tion of Sikhs in the two World Wars.

As the month of May 2018 draws to a close, I thought it per­ti­nent to share the role of Sikh sol­diers of the Meerut and La­hore Di­vi­sions who took part in the Bat­tle of Fes­tu­bert, France on 19 May, 1915.The bat­tle of Fes­tu­bert, 15-27 May 1915, was the sec­ond British con­tri­bu­tion to the sec­ond bat­tle of Ar­tois, the ma­jor Al­lied spring of­fen­sive of 1915.

Lieu­tenant John Smyth of the 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs was or­dered to take a bomb­ing party and two boxes of bombs from the old front­line to the cap­tured trench over open ground with ten vol­un­teers of 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. By the time they reached their ob­jec­tive,  only one man was left with him, the rest were ei­ther killed or wounded. Lieu­tenant John Smyth was awarded the Vic­to­ria Cross and all those who were with him were awarded medals. One sol­dier was awarded the In­dian Or­der of Merit (IOM) and 9 oth­ers were be­stowed the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal (IDSM).

Ac­cord­ing to Com­mon­wealth War Graves Com­mis­sion -CWGC Record, they have ap­prised in their let­ter dated 21 May 2018 that as per their their records only 2 of the 10 Sikhs who were part of the troops of Lieu­tenant Smith died at the time.

The re­port says, 10 Sikhs took part in the mis­sion, 2 died  in the Mis­sion and 8 were wounded. One died in 1918 be­cause of the wounds or an other ac­tion, is not clear. That has been recorded. Per­haps the other 7 died a nat­ural death later on and are not recorded. His­to­rian Charles Allen has called them the 10 Sikh Su­per­men..

The names of the two who died are recorded at Neuve Chapelle Memo­r­ial, France. Their de­tails are as fol­lows:

Har­nam Singh, Se­poy, 1360. I D S M. 19th Pun­jabis, attd. , 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. 19 May 1915. Son of Atar Singh, of Ba­jwara, Hoshiarpur, Pun­jab. Grave Ref­er­ence: Panel 27.

Sarain Singh, Se­poy, 1255. I D S M. 19th Pun­jabis, attd., 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. 19 May 1915. Son of Chet Singh, of Tal­wandi, Rya, Sialkot, Pun­jab. Grave Ref­er­ence: Panel 27.

Of the other sol­diers, one of them died in Italy and his de­tails are:  

Fateh Singh,  died in Italy on 29/​10/​1918

Fateh Singh, I D S M, Bronze Mil­i­tary Medal for Val­our ( Italy ) Hav­il­dar, Ser­vice Num­ber 1036, Died 29/​10/​1918, 45th Rat­tray’s Sikhs, Son of Ladha Singh of Lakhan Ka Chak, Daska, Sialkot, Pun­jab.

A list of the 10 Sikhs who took part in this mis­sion was ob­tained from the Lon­don Gazette. They are as fol­lows:

1. 1. Ser­vice Num­ber 131, Lance Naik, Man­gal Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the sec­ond class Or­der of Merit (IOM)
   2. Ser­vice Num­ber 702, Se­poy Lal Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal.
   3. Ser­vice Num­ber 638, Se­poy Sucha Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal.
   4. Ser­vice Num­ber 962, Se­poy, Sa­pu­ran Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal.
   5. Ser­vice Num­ber 1255, Se­poy, Sarain  Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal.
   6. Ser­vice Num­ber 1036, Se­poy, Fateh Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal (IDSM)
   7. Ser­vice Num­ber 1001, Se­poy, Uja­gar Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal (IDSM)
   8. Ser­vice Num­ber 1249, Se­poy, Sun­dar Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal (IDSM)
   9. Ser­vice Num­ber 1339, Se­poy, Ganda Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal (IDSM)
   10. Ser­vice Num­ber 1360, Se­poy, Har­nam Singh, 15th Lud­hi­ana Sikhs. Awarded the In­dian Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Medal (IDSM) 

 If you like our sto­ries, do fol­low WSN on Face­book.