John Howie Carslaw was born on 14th August 1896 at 8 Park Avenue, Glasgow. This wasn’t a street name I recognised, but it turns out to be the small road up the side of the St Andrews Building, off of Woodlands Road. Here’s the 1894 map and as it only shows one house on the street, I imagine that is where John was born:
John’s parents were William Henderson Carslaw and Margaret Kay who had married the previous year in Helensburgh.
His father was an engineer, to be more precise a boilermaker working for Muir & Findlay. The company’s speciality was vertical boilers and they were based at Parkhead Boiler Works, 220 to 226 East Wellington Street, Parkhead.
To orientate you notice Celtic Park in the bottom left corner, and the modern shopping centre is immediately north of the Eastern Necropolis. Parkhead Boiler Works is ringed in red in the centre-right of the photo.
John had two younger siblings, brother Ronald and sister Christina
At the time of the 1901 Census John was staying at his grandparents’ house but he seems to have been in the care of an uncle and two aunts.
The address is 36 Sutherland Avenue:
John attended Glasgow Academy and then Fettes College in Edinburgh.
By the time of the 1911 Census the family lived on Boclair Road, Bearsden at Camptower (number 5):
Apart from John, his parents and siblings, there are two servants, 25-year old Mary McLeod who could speak Gaelic and came from Kilmuir, and the cook from Ireland 38-year old Mary McGee.
Camptower on a Google Earth view, the station, garage and shops at Hillfoot in the middle-distance.
Only three years later, Britain declared war on Germany on 4th August, John’s 18th birthday was 14th August and he was gazetted as a second lieutenant on 9th September.
John became a lieutenant in III Lowland Brigade, Royal Field Artillery Brigade; he joined A Battery which had its office in Berkeley Street, Glasgow. He served in Gallipoli (from 14th September 1915), then Egypt and finally Palestine. In each case the enemy was Turkey with the backing of Germany. By this stage, the battery had 18-pounder field guns:
Here the gun is being pulled by four horses
“On 19 November the EEF moved east into the Judaean Hills to begin closing in on Jerusalem. XXI Corps was sent to capture the Nebi Samwill ridge. The village itself was captured by surprise on 21 November, but moving artillery on the hill roads was difficult. The onset of heavy rain made the conditions worse, but by employing 10-horse teams, 52nd (L) Divisional Artillery got 10 guns (including a section of each of A and B/CCLXII) up for 75th Division’s attack on El Jib on 23 November, described by the corps commander as ‘a magnificent feat’. Although too late to prevent that attack from failing, the sections were in position in a dip in the ground south-east of Biddu when the attack was renewed next day by 52nd (L) Division. Nevertheless, that attack also failed, and while Nebi Samwill itself had been successfully held, the wider attacks were called off and 52nd (L) Division went into reserve. The Turks threw in fierce counter-attacks, but when they had been beaten off Jerusalem fell without a fight on 9 December.” (Source)
Despite being part of “the magnificent feat”, John was wounded with A Battery on 25th November 1917, and he died the following day at El Kubeibeh near Jerusalem. He was buried at the monastery:
Photo taken on 9th January 1918, about six weeks after John was buried there, from National Army Museum collection (source)
He was subsequently reburied at Jerusalem War Cemetery. On John’s headstone are the words selected by his father, “So that my life be brave, what though not long?” (a quote from the Victorian poet, William Drummond).
