Battles Gallery

Matania - Last Absolution of the Munsters

The Last General Absolution of the Munsters at Rue du Bois - painting by Fortunino Matania. This painting relates to an incident in France in May of 1915, when the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Munster Fusiliers suffered very heavily at Rue du Bois, in the Pas de Calais close to Arras. The action was only one of many local attacks which ended disastrously through lack of support. Colonel Victor Rickard, recently appointed to command, was killed in the attack, as was his Adjutant, Captain Filgate. Both are represented in the picture, alongside Father Gleeson, who is shown giving the Absolution on the evening prior to the action taking place.
1915

© Mary Evans Picture Library 2015 - https://copyrighthub.org/s0/hub1/creation/maryevans/MaryEvansPictureID/10510942

The Canadians at Ypres - William Barnes Wollen

The Canadians at Ypres 1915 - This depicts the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry at Bellewaerde Ridge on 8th May 1915. At that time the Regiment was part of the 80th Brigade, 27th Division, British Expeditionary Force. The Stonewall Brigade was under the command of General Snow. Original painting is in the PPCLI Regimental Museum at the Museum of the Regiments in Calgary, Alberta, Canada Date: 1915

© David Cohen Fine Art/Mary Evans Picture Library

Colonel James Skinner holding a Regimental Durbar

Colonel James Skinner holding a Regimental Durbar, 1827.Watercolour with gouache on European paper by Ghulam Ali Khan (fl 1817-1855), 1827.Inscribed in Nastaliq script lower left ?The work of Ghulam Ali Khan the painter, resident of the Seat of the Empire Shahjahanabad, it was completed in the Christian year 1827?Skinner, seated centre left, may be seen presiding over a durbar of his regiment, an occasion when any soldier was at liberty to raise with his commanding officer anything that concerned him. The holding of a durbar, when Skinner mixed freely with his soldiers and men, was a conscious re-creation of Afghan and Mughal military and ceremonial traditions, which gave his soldiers a corporate sense of their upward mobility in the Company's service.The son of a Scottish officer of the Bengal Army and a Rajput girl whom he had captured during the war against the Raja of Benares, James Skinner's (1778-1841) military career commenced with eight years service in the part European officered Maratha army. In 1803 when war broke out between the British and the Marathas he obliged to leave their service and after their defeat was made commander of 800 horsemen who joined the British. Such were the origins of what was to become the senior regiment of the Indian cavalry, Skinner's Horse (1st Duke of York's Own Cavalry). In 1827 the regiment was known as the 1st Regiment of Local Horse and had just been awarded the battle honour Bhurtpore for its part in the reduction of the fortress at Bharatpur, Skinner himself being made a Companion of the Order of the Bath. Skinner was well aware that on more than one occasion, racial prejudice against Eurasion officers had interfered with his advancement in the Company's service - counterbalanced only by his employers awareness of the important part he and his men played in their military build up, providing the light cavalry needed so urgently to fight the Pindaris and Marathas, and later settling conquered territory. In the lat

© The National Army Museum / Mary Evans Picture Library