Roll of Honour
Lance Corporal
Ernest Charles McLaren
Student
Ernest McLaren was born on the 21st February 1898 at 22 Low Road, Forfar, Forfarshire. He was the younger son of William Herald McLaren, a Mercantile Clerk, and his wife Agnes Booth McLaren (née Irons) who had married on the 3rd August 1888, also in Forfar. In 1914 he took the preliminary examinations for the University of Glasgow, passing tests in English, Higher Mathematics, French and Dynamics. The next year Ernest enrolled at the University to study Engineering and as part of his studies took classes in Mathematics, Chemistry and Natural Philosophy.
In March 1916, the Military Service Act came into force and, soon after, Ernest was conscripted into the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, No. 17682. Private McLaren underwent a period of training in the UK before he was sent out to France to join ‘D’ Company of the 11th Bn. Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. By mid-1917 he had been promoted to the rank of Lance Corporal.
On the 9th July 1917, Ernest and his battalion took over a portion of the front-line trenches in the Ypres Salient. Four days later on the 13th July, Ernest’s company came under heavy bombardment from German Artillery. The men kept alive by ‘shunting from bay to bay and back again’ literally dodging the enemy shells. Although this trick minimised casualties, the bombardment still killed six men of Ernest’s Company and wounded four more. Among the dead was Ernest himself, he was 19 years old. The location of his remains has since been lost and Ernest’s name is now inscribed on the Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial for the missing. He is also remembered on the Forfar Memorial in the town of his birth.
Comments and Citations
University of Glasgow Registry records.
Biography: Biographical information compiled by Great War Project Researcher Euan Loarridge.
The University of Glasgow is a registered Scottish charity: Registration Number SC004401
