In memory of

Lance-Corporal William Telfer

15th Cyclist Battalion, Army Cyclist Corps

†October 6th 1916, age 20

Son of John and Agnes Telfer, Castlecraig

Remembered with honour at

HEILLY STATION CEMETER, MERICOURT-L’ABBE

Private William Telfer, second son of Mr John Telfer, Craigurd, Castlecraig, Dolphinton, died of wounds in France on 1st October, 1916. Before the war he was a ploughman in the employment of Lord Glenconner, at the home farm of Glen.  He joined the 12th Battalion Royal Scots a month after war broke out.  Six months later he was transferred into the Army Cyclist Corps with which unit he went to France in September, 1915.  He saw much fighting, and was through the first battle of the Somme.  He seems to have been severely wounded while on cycle despatch work, and when picked up he was dead.  He was buried at Heilly Station Cemetery, near Corbie, but his parents were never able to get any definite particulars of their son’s gallant end.  He was born at West Mains, Castlecraig, and was just twenty when he died.  He was well known and highly thought of, both in his home district at Kirkurd and at Glen.

The burials in this cemetery were carried out under extreme pressure and many of the graves are either too close together to be marked individually, or they contain multiple burials. Some headstones carry as many as three sets of casualty details, and in these cases, regimental badges have had to be omitted. Instead, these badges, 117 in all, have been carved on a cloister wall on the north side of the cemetery.