Alford Image Library

Safely home.

This is an intriguing photograph since many rural settlements were decimated by losses in the Great War. Were all these men from Leochel-Cushnie? Given the losses in the 6th and 7th Gordon Highlanders in 1915, and the subsequent ravages of the Great Influenza Epidemic at the end of the War, it's perhaps surprising to find so many survived. For an interesting contrast, try reading No Thankful Village by Chris Howell (Fickle Hill 2002, ISBN 0 947660 04 6) which gives an account of the effects of the Great War on a similar rural area in Somerset.