22nd March 1855 - ON THIS DAY IN ROYAL WELCH HISTORY
The death of Major William Pitcairn CAMPBELL
Major William Campbell was severely wounded at the Battle of the Alma on 20 September 1854. He was evacuated to Scutari, turkey where he was further weakened by disease and passed away on 22 March 1855.
Born in 1824 at 131 Dale St, Liverpool the youngest son of the Reverend Augustus Campbell, Rector of Liverpool, Vicar of Childwall Liverpool from 1824 to 1870. He was the nephew of Sir John Campbell, and of Major-General W Campbell.
He was commissioned 2nd lieutenant RWF 6 August 1841; lieutenant 4 August 1843; captain 16 April 1847; brevet major 12 December 1854; major 29 December 1854.
He served with RWF in Barbados and Canada before proceeding to the Crimea. At the battle of Alma he was slightly wounded in the head and later received a ball in the thigh which obliged him to go to the rear. Lord Raglan in his despatch of 11 November 1854 (LG 2 December 1854) relating to officers who had distinguished themselves at Inkerman took the opportunity to correct his omission to mention Captain W. Pitcairn Campbell in his despatch of 28 September. He reported that Captain Campbell ‘became the Senior Officer of the 23rd Regiment, when Lieutenant-Colonel Chester was killed, and, though severely wounded, could hardly be persuaded to quit the field’.
Appointed to the staff at Scutari, Turkey, Major Campbell developed fever and, weakened by his wounds and ‘over-exertion in the discharge of his duties in the hospital as deputy assistant quartermaster-general’, he died, aged 31, on 22 March 1855. His grave in Haidar Pasha Cemetery, Istanbul, Turkey bears the inscription:
Dedicated by his Brother Officers to the Memory of William Pitcairn Campbell aged 30, Major 23rd Royal Welsh Fusiliers, wounded on the Alma. He was appointed a Staff Officer at Scutari, and died there of Fever, March 22nd, 1855.
A Christian Soldier, finding comfort in death from these assuring words of the Saviour, in whom he trusted: “Come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden, ans I will give you rest.” – Matt. 11th ch., 28th v.
Obituary
Smith, Henry Stooks, The Military Obituary for 1855, Parker, Furnivall, and Parker,
London 1856, page 12
Hardwicke’s Annual Biography for 1856, page 140–1
The Annual Register for 1855, London 1856, page 263 The Gentleman’s Magazine, January–June 1855, page 657
Memorials
All Saints Church, Childwall, Liverpool. An ‘ornate painted illuminated metal memorial within a plain oak frame’. UKNIWM 15854 has complete inscription. Carmarthen, regimental Crimean War memorial (UKNIWM 6923). For a list of names engraved on the memorial, see Spurrell, William, Carmarthen and its Neighborhood, (2nd Edn.) William Spurrell Carmarthen April 1879, pages 57–9
References
a. The Times 21 April 1855 – death announcement
b. Lysons, General Sir Daniel, The Crimean War from First to Last, John Murray, c. Haidar Pasa Cemetery listings at
http://www.levantine.plus.com/pdf/haidarpashacem.pdf
d. W. H. Russell, A Diary in the East during the Tour of the Prince and Princess of Wales, G. Routledge & Sons, London, 1869, page 638 – Scutari Cemetery
