Sergeant Thomas McIlwain MM DCM

This is a photo of my grandfather's battalion from the First World War - taken at Bramshott in 1915. My Grandfather was later to win the Military Medal and Distinguished Conduct Medal and was mentioned in dispatches, He was wounded in France in 1917 when he single handedly captured a German machine gun post and saved his fellow combatants.

He tried to destroy this photo before he died - that is why it is ripped apart.

I can't begin to understand how he felt about the war and its effect on the life of his generation. What I remember about him is how irascible he was but perhaps given his history it was to be expected.