From a basic list ....

[Lachlan09]

If you’re interested in 20th Century military history as I am, I’ve just been doing a little bit of social study into my surname, in relation to the Great War (WW1). My surname is Gow, a Perthshire Highland name connected with the Confederation of Clan Chattan and Clan MacPherson. It’s not a very popular surname, though its English counterpart, Smith, is very popular, so looking for information is of a manageable size.

I went to the CWGC website basically to see how many “British” Gows are listed as WW1 deaths and to see when and how they died. I realize that, apart from some potentially distantly-related Perthshire Gows, any other Gows who appear would be a very distant relationship indeed, if any. Some of the Gows are likely to be English rather than Scottish of course.

However, even from a rather dry, flat alphabetical listing such as CWGC, with a bit of Excel re-arrangement and date sorting etc, the results were most interesting, being surprisingly revealing and reflecting quite well Scotland’s participation in the war. Some entries are very poignant in their dates. 63 deaths are listed, 60 in the British Army and 3 in the Royal Navy. That is not surprising as even my own Gow forebears were of the land rather than the sea.

3 died in 1914, 14 in 1915, 19 in 1916, 14 in 1917 and 13 in 1918.
Most Gow deaths occurred during the month of September – 15 in all.
Over the war years, most Gows died on a Saturday (15 of them).

The youngest Gow whose age is mentioned was 18, the oldest was 37.
The first Gow died at Mons on 23 August 1914 and the last on 10 November 1918.

Most Gows killed in one offensive campaign (12 nos) died between 1 July and 18 November 1916 during the Battle of the Somme (The Somme Offensive ceased on 16 November, but the last Gow died on 18th, likely of wounds sustained). Most Gows who died on or around the same date (7 nos) died at the Battle of Loos between 25 and 29 September 1915. These pretty well align with Scotland’s participation during these battles. Loos was the first major participation by Scotland’s volunteer formations, the 9th and 15th Scottish Divisions, plus a lesser role by the 51st Highland Div. During this same period, a Gow of the 52nd Lowland Div died at Gallipoli.

Most Gows who died served in the Black Watch (11nos) which is not surprising considering the Perthshire background of the regiment. A further 10 Gows were in the Seaforths, 6 were in the HLI, with 5 in the Argylls.

The most poignant were the first and last deaths and even from the simple CWGC unemotional listing, you can feel the sadness. I deduced that the two first Gows to die were brothers. Earlier suspecting this to be the case, I contacted the relevant regimental museum who confirmed my hunch was correct. 7502 Private George J. Gow joined the 1st Batt Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry at Shoreditch, London in 1910 as a regular. His brother 7706 Private William T. Gow joined 2 years later. At Mons, Belgium on 23 August 1914, elements of the B.E.F. engaged the superior numbers of Von Kluck’s 1st Army in a delaying action, Britain’s first battle of the war. 1st D.O.C.L.I was brigaded in 14 Bde/5 Reg Div, II Corps. William Gow was killed during the fighting that day. His brother George survived and his brother’s death must have weighed heavily on him as the bloodied but proud BEF slipped away at night to prepare further delaying actions. Four days later, on 27 August, elements of the BEF mounted a desperate rearguard action at Le Cateau. George Gow was killed during that action.

Also poignant was that on 10th November 1918, one day before the Armistice came into force and the shooting stopped, 14482 Private James P. Gow of the Cameron Highlanders was the last Gow of the war to die. His burial place is not far from Mons, where the war started for the British four years earlier.

In WW2, the number of dead Gows reduced to 15, but is interesting to note that while there are Black Watch and Argylls, the majority of them were RAF personnel and also included are a family of Gow civilians killed during a Luftwaffe raid on London and also a civilian in Malaya in 1943, a civilian POW.

All that info from an official list !