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John Sherwood Kelly was born in the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa on 13 January 1880 and served from the age of 16 in various corps in the Matabele War, Boer War, Somaliland Campaign, Zulu Bambatha Rebellion, First World War (Gallipoli and Western front), and briefly in the invasion of North Russia.
Joining the Colours
There they go marching all in step so gay!
Smooth-cheeked and golden, food for shells and guns.
Blithely they go as to a wedding day,
The mothers' sons.
The drab street stares to see them row on row
On the high tram-tops, singing like the lark.
Too careless-gay for courage, singing they go
Into the dark.
With tin whistles, mouth-organs, any noise,
They pipe the way to glory and the grave;
Foolish and young, the gay and golden boys
Love cannot save.
High heart! High courage! The poor girls they kissed
Run with them : they shall kiss no more, alas!
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The British Kenya Emergency, also known as the Mau Mau rebellion or revolt, was an uprising in Kenya against British colonial rule. On 3 October 1952, the Mau Mau murdered the first European victim, stabbing a woman to death near her home in Thika and then on 9 October, shot dead Senior Chief Waruhiu, a supporter of the colonial government. Following these murders, the Colonial Office authorised a State of Emergency which the Governor, Evelyn Baring, signed on 20 October 1952.
The 1st Battalion The Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers served twice in Kenya; from 1953-1955 and 1960-1963. During the former period, the Battalion was flown to the colony at short notice during the Mau Mau uprising.
Mau Mau, drawn mainly from the Kikuyu tribe, concentrated on raiding European farms, destroying crops and animals, and killing or intimidating both white and black Kenyans. The Battalion alternated between Nairobi, operating roadblocks, cordon and search operations and in the area northeast of Mount Kenya where patrols, sweeps and ambushes were carried out. In 1955, the Regiment was awarded the Freedom of the City of Nairobi, a unique honour as no other British regiment has ever been awarded the Freedom of a colonial city.
These are the keys to the courtyard of Colditz Castle (Oflag IV-C) which were removed by Lieutenant (later Major) Richard Morgan, Royal Ulster Rifles and No.2 Commando in 16 April 1945 after liberation by 3rd Bn. 273 Infantry (Colonel Shaughnessy) 69 Infantry Division (Fighting 69th) United States Army.
Lieutenant Dick Morgan and Lieutenant Corran Purdon MC, Royal Ulster Rifles and No. 12 Commando fought in the ranks of this battalion until evacuated to England.
The keys were presented by the Morgan family, Randsburg, South Africa, November 1999.
The attack on Chocolate Hill had inflicted eight officer and 92 other rank casualties on the 6th Battalion The Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers. They were withdrawn on 10 August to rejoin the 10th (Irish) Division where they met up with their sister battalion, the 5th Battalion, at a position in front of Kiretch Tepe Sirt. An attack on its 'Kidney Hill' feature by 30 and 31 Brigade was ordered for 15 August and the 5th Battalion's objective was the spur known as Kidney Ridge; the 6th Battalion was in reserve.
Killaloe is one of the most famous and distinctive marches of the British Army and of its Irish regiments in particular. It is the Regimental Quick March of The Royal Irish Regiment and was inherited from The Royal Irish Rangers when The Ulster Defence Regiment was merged with the Rangers to form The Royal Irish Regiment.
The Band of The Royal Irish Regiment, a Reserve Army Band, plays Killaloe.
On behalf of HM The King, the Governor and Commander-in-Chief, Straits Settlements, Sir Shenton Thomas, presented a new King's Colour to the 1st Battalion The Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers in Singapore on 25 August 1938.
During the 1945 Potsdam Conference, the strident 'western' Allies, boosted by the US possession of the Atom Bomb, had implied that the 38th parallel was a likely border along which to divide the Korean peninsula between Communist eastern and western free-world interests. Three months after Victory in Europe, and two days after an atom bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan on 8 August 1945.
