Tuesday 26 April 2016

Ypres 2016 - Loos Memorial Lt John Kipling

Commemorated on the Loos Memorial is Lt John Kipling, the son of English journalist, short-story writer, poet, and novelist Rudyard Kipling,


Lt John Kipling Irish Guards
Loos Memorial
 
John Kipling was born in 17th August 1897 in Sussex. He was educated at Wellington College, Berkshire.

Rudyard Kipling was a keen imperialist, patriot and  supporter of the war who wrote propaganda on behalf of the Government. On reaching an age when John could join the Army, Rudyard Kipling sought to obtain a commission for his son. Initially John Kipling was rejected by the Royal Navy due to poor eyesight, his father then used his influence for his son to be commissioned into the Irish Guards.

Lt John Kipling Irish Guards
John Kipling was commissioned into the Irish Guards 15th September 1914 (LG 15-Sep-1914 7303) from the Special Reserve of Officers. He arrived in France on 17th August 1915 – just over 6 weeks later he was reported missing in action.
On 27th September 1915 during the Battle of Loos, he was leading his platoon from the 2nd Battalion Irish Guards in the area of Chalk Pit Wood, when according to the battalion War Diary he was wounded and went missing.
His father Rudyard Kipling and mother Carrie launched a search for their missing son. They visited war hospitals, interviewed soldiers from the Irish Guards and sought help from all quarters in order to find their son. Rudyard Kipling asked neutral ambassadors in Sweden to contact the Germans, as well as the Red Cross, to investigate if John had been found behind enemy lines.
John Kipling’s whereabouts were not ascertained, and after searching for 4 years Rudyard Kipling, in June 1919, wrote a letter to the Army accepting that his son was dead.
John Kipling's name was added to the Loos Memorial which remembers those lost in the area with no known grave. Rudyard Kipling died in 1936.
In 1992 the Commonwealth War Graves Commission confirmed that the grave of a unknown Irish Guards Lieutenant buried in St Mary’s ADS Cemetery, north of Loos-en-Gohelle, was that of John Kipling.
The headstone of an unidentified Irish Guards Lieutenant was changed to Lieutenant John Kipling Irish Guards.
 
John Kipling
Graves Registration Form