30 MARCH - ON THIS DAY IN ROYAL WELCH HISTORY

Sergeant Ford 17 RWF won Albert Medal, 1916

Sgt Albert Ford was instructing men in live grenade throwing at Gorre, France. A grenade was thrown so that it hit the traverse and dropped, smoking, into the trench. Ford pushed past the man and managed to pick it up and throw it clear. It exploded immediately on leaving his hand. In 1940 the Albert Medal was replaced by the George Cross. In 1972 Ford exchanged his AM for a GC, the only Royal Welchman to receive this rare award.

We are looking for RWF photos in WW1 - can you help us?

Royal Welch Fusiliers Museum seek WW1 photos
We at the Royal Welch Fusiliers Museum in Caernarfon are starting the mammoth task of looking for photos of individual soldiers from the RWF who were fought in the Great War.

We are trying to put each man’s name (who Fell) on display on a screen on the centenary of his death and would dearly love to be able to add a photograph of each man to go with his name. It is a huge undertaking as there were over 10,400 men from the RWF that were killed. But even if we only get a fraction of the photographs we believe it is worth doing. Many of the RWF were from all over so we are asking please could you help?

You can help us by circulating our plea to anybody who is interested. Many families have photographs tucked away so this might prompt them to seek them out. We accept scans or copies and any that appeared in newspapers, which often carried obituaries including photographs.
We need as much information as possible to go with the photo to make sure we fit the right photo to the right man – but sometimes a name and date of death might be all we need.

Email us on rwfmuseum1@btconnect.com for more details or to send us a photo. You can also follow our progress on Twitter, Pinterest, Flickr, Tumblr and Facebook 

RWF Museum seek RWF WW1 photos

#WW1Centenary We are working on creating a WW1 archive of all RWF soldiers. Need photographs please! rwfmuseum1@btconnect.com

By Nick Lock

26 March 1917 - First battle of Gaza, Palestine, 1917

The 5th, 6th and 7th Battalions RWF were pre-WWI Territorial Force Battalions recruited in Flintshire, Anglesey & Caernarvonshire, and Montgomeryshire & Merionethshire respectively. All three Battalions served in 158th Brigade or the 53rd (Welsh) Infantry Division. 158th Brigade was the only Brigade of the 53rd (Welsh) Division to be committed to the 1st Battle of Gaza. The attached map shows the attack route for 158th Brigade left lower centre of the map. The 5th, 6th and 7th Battalions successfully took their objective by noon. The Turks in Gaza were on the point of surrendering when the British high command, due to much confusion decided to order a withdrawal. The three battalions had 692 casualties during the day.

Royal Welch Fusilier Museum is in Caernarfon Castle

The Museum is housed in Caernarfon Castle.  In it you will find a wealth of original exhibits, supported by film,  sound and models, which tell the story of over 300 years of service by Wales’ oldest infantry regiment, in peacetime and in war, all around the world.

Visit our Museum and you can learn how the Regiment won 14 Victoria Crosses and hear the words of the famous writers who served with the Royal Welch during the First World War - Siegfried Sassoon, Robert Graves, “Hedd Wyn”, David Jones and Frank Richards. 

You will see what life was like for the ordinary soldier and his family and discover the Regiment’s  unique traditions Royal Welch history begins with the campaigns of William III, and includes Marlborough’s wars, the American War of Independence, the wars with Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, the Crimean War, the Boer  War and China. 

Many battalions of the Regiment saw action in the First and Second World Wars.  

In peacetime the Royal Welch has provided garrison troops in Canada, India, Hong Kong and the West Indies.

More recently the Royal Welch has carried out many tours of duty in Northern Ireland and has been deployed on peace-keeping and humanitarian operations, often under the UN or NATO.   These have included missions in Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan. 

On March 1st 2006 the three Welsh infantry regiments combined to form a new regiment – The Royal Welsh.  The title of the Royal Welch Fusiliers now is 1st Battalion The Royal Welsh (The Royal Welch Fusiliers).

The Museum has thousands of stories to tell - from the experiences of an individual soldier to the history of an entire battalion.  Many of the objects on display have a hidden history linking them to a soldier, places and events.  It is not possible to explore all these stories within the Museum where space is limited.

Instead items of particular interest will appear on our website www.rwfmuseum.org.uk and here on our social media pages Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr Flickr and now Blogger - presented by experts and enthusiasts alike.  New stories are regularly added so there should always be something new to read.  If you would like to contribute a short article about an object on display or an aspect of Royal Welch history, please contact us on rwfmuseum1@btconnect.com.

Croeso - Welcome to the new RWF Museum blog

Croeso - Welcome to the Royal Welch Fusilier blog page. We have a Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr and Flickr presence so we would like to post longer articles here as well as updates on our RWF Faces of WW1 project. 

You can contact us on rwfmuseum1@btconnect.com if you have any ideas for this blog.
Thank you. Diolch yn fawr