New names added to university's First World War memorial

Captain William Campbell Church, left, and Captain William Turner will be added to the memorial. Picture: SWNS

Among the 19 names are a successful rugby player who was capped for Scotland, a respected doctor and a grocer’s son who cut short his studies to join the war effort.

A century after the end of the war their names will be carved in stone alongside those of the men and women already remembered in the University Memorial Chapel, with descendants invited to memorial services on Remembrance Sunday.

Researchers identified the 19 additional names through digital resources and confirmed their connection to the university using student records held by the University of Glasgow Archives.

One of those being honoured is Captain William Campbell Church who played rugby for Scotland against Wales in 1906. He started studying mercantile law at the university in 1905 and became a stockbroker, but enlisted with the 8th Battalion Cameronians (Scottish Rifles) during the First World War. Captain Church was 32 when he was killed by machine gun fire at Gallipoli. His body was never found but he is remembered on the Scottish National War Memorial, Kelvinside Academy War Memorial, Glasgow Academy War Memorial, Scottish Rugby Union Memorial and the Wellington Church War Memorial.

Captain William Turner was a doctor in Saltcoats, Ayrshire after gaining a first class degree in surgery at the University of Glasgow. When war broke out, the father-of-three joined the Royal Army Medical Corps but he returned home to fight the acute pneumonia he had contracted on active service, and died in April 1918 at the age of 43.

His name was not recorded originally because he died in hospital in England rather than being killed in action.

Private Archibald James Shanks Morrison from Whithorn, Wigtonshire, was the son of a grocer who matriculated in 1916 aged 17. He studied for one year before joining the King’s Own Scottish Borderers. He was killed in action in May 1918.

Katie McDonald, a researcher with the College of Arts, University of Glasgow, said: “We are still piecing together the stories behind the names of the fallen and ask anyone who has any information about them and any pictures of them to get in touch.”

University chaplain the Rev Stuart MacQuarrie said: “It’s right to honour all of our fallen with their names engraved on an additional stone panel in the Memorial Chapel, which was built to remember the great sacrifice made by the university’s students, staff and alumni during the First World War.”