Page 63 - Bugle Spring 2025

CENTRAL
Bristol Branch
SCLI, LI and Rifles
Association -
Commemoration
of the 80th
anniversary Battle of Hill 112
Hereford Branch of the KSLI, LI and Rifles Association
– Visit to Soldiers of Gloucestershire Museum
A party of Branch members greatly enjoyed a visit to the Soldiers of Gloucestershire Museum in October 2024.
Remembrance
Sunday In Hereford
Members of the Hereford
Branch, supported by a
detachment from A Coy
6 RIFLES, laid KSLI and
LI wreaths at the War
Memorial in Hereford on
Remembrance Sunday.
In July the Bristol Branch of the Association
joined with members of A Company 6
RIFLES to hear a presentation by Branch
President, Brigadier John Hemsley, on
the key Normandy battle for Hill 112. 43rd
Wessex Division, which comprised Territorial
battalions from the West Country including
the Somerset Light Infantry and the Duke
of Cornwall’s Light Infantry, bore the brunt
of the fighting. 6 RIFLES is the successor of
these famous Regiments.
All those attending were welcomed by OC A
Company, Major Dan Braycotton, and, after the
presentation, serving reservists and veterans
enjoyed a curry supper at the invitation of
the Association. The opportunity to get the
generations together was appreciated by all.
Restoration of Gloucestershire Regiment wooden crosses from First World War
September marked the culmination of a
six-year project to restore and re-home
wooden crosses that were retrieved
from the battlefields after the end of the
First World War and put up in a corner of
Cheltenham cemetery by the families of the
Fallen. After a century, they were starting
to decay, so Cheltenham Civic Society and
Pitville School, supported by the Heritage
National Lottery Fund, undertook a project
to restore these memorials and to find a
permanent home for them. Fourteen of
these crosses had marked the original
graves of soldiers from the Gloucestershire
Regiment.
Mr Edward Gillespie OBE, HM Lord-
Lieutenant of Gloucestershire, opened the
new permanent home for the restored crosses
in the old grave diggers hut in Cheltenham
Cemetery. The Gloucestershire Regiment and
The Rifles were represented by the Standard
Bearers and the Rifles County Colonel, Lt Col
Tony Ayres, as well as by many who supported
the project.
RIFLES The Bugle 63