The Commemoration of the
95th Anniversary of the Battle of the Somme
The 16th (Irish) Division Service,
Guillemont, France
Friday 1st July 2011
At 1630hrs
“Our greatest success on the 3rd September 1916 was the capture of Guillemont by the Irish troops. They advanced on Guillemont with an impetuosity which carried all before it: charged through the German positions with the wild music of their pipes playing them on. Before the afternoon was out the 2000 Prussians who constituted the garrison- with imperative orders to hold the ground at all cost- were killed, wounded or captured. The same Irish troops charged into Ginchy as they had charged into Guillemont, through the barrage of shells and the storm of machine-gun fire, clambering over shell-holes, fallen trees, and the great mounds of bricks and rubble which were all that remained of the village itself; cheering like mad, and driving the enemy before them in a fierce assault against which nothing could stand.”
ORDER OF DIVINE SERVICE
The Band of The Royal Irish Regiment (TA) shall play the Regimental Slow March as The Queen’s and Regimental Colour of the 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Regiment shall be marched on
WELCOME
Dr Ian Adamson, OBE, Chairman of The Somme Association
REPLY
His Royal Highness The Duke of Gloucester KG GCVO
The Service shall be conducted by The Reverend Canon Alex Cheevers
PRAYERS
Followed by The Lord’s Prayer
THE LESSON
Revelation Chapter 21 verses 1-5
READING
Historical account by Historian Frank A Mumby
Read by a Soldier of the 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Regiment
POEM
“To my daughter Betty, the gift of God” by Tom Kettle
Read by a Soldier of the 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Regiment
“THE ACT OF REMEMBRANCE”
THE EXHORTATION
Lt Col C Weir, Commanding Officer 1 R IRISH
Response: “We Will Remember Them”
THE LAST POST
Silence shall be observed for one minute
THE REVEILLE
THE PIPER’S LAMENT
THE PLACING OF THE WREATHS
Announced by Dr Ian Adamson, High Sheriff of Belfast,
Chairman of The Somme Association
When the final wreath has been laid at the 16th (Irish) Division Cross, His Royal Highness The Duke of Gloucester KG GCVO will proceed to lay a wreath at the French Memorial.
THE BENEDICTION
THE NATIONAL ANTHEMS
French, Irish, British
The Regimental Quick March is played as The Colours are paraded off
Guests are now invited to visit the village church to see the
restoration work which the villagers have carried out with
the assistance of The Somme Association.
“To my daughter Betty, the gift of God” by Tom Kettle
In wiser days my darling rosebud, blown
To beauty proud as was your mother’s prime,
In that desired, delayed, incredible time,
You’ll ask why I abandoned you, my own,
And the dear heart that was your baby throne,
To dice with death. And, oh! they’ll give you rhyme
And reason, some will call the thing sublime,
And some decry it in a knowing tone.
So here, while the mad guns curse overhead,
And tired men sigh, with mud for couch and floor
Know that we fools, now with the foolish dead,
Died not for flag, nor King, nor Emperor,
But for a dream, born in a herdsman’s shed,
And for the secret Scripture of the poor.
The Somme Association would like to thank The Band, Bugles, Pipes and Drums of The Royal Irish Regiment (TA), 1st & 2nd Battalions The Royal Irish Regiment, 38th (Irish) Brigade,
The Reverend Canon Alex Cheevers, Monsieur Didier Samain
and the villagers of Guillemont and Ginchy.