Digital roll of honour remembers regiment soldiers fallen in WWI

A “virtual museum” has been created to help remember some of the Scots who died in the First World War, a university has revealed.

Experts from the University of St Andrews’ school of computer science have worked with the Royal Scots Museum in Edinburgh to create a digital roll of honour for all the members of the regiment who were killed in the conflict from 1914 to 1918.

It contains information on the soldiers’ lives, deaths, medals and graves – as well as any photographs that are available of them.

The university, which is taking part in Poppy Scotland’s national Light Up Red campaign this weekend, said one in 10 of all its graduates who perished in the Great War served with the Royal Scots.

Among those featured in the roll of honour is Charles Whitehead Yule, who was killed near Vermelles in France on May 11, 1916 at the age of 26.

The son of a builder from Kinghorn in Fife, he went on to gain a first class honours degree in classics and economic science, then a BLitt postgraduate degree from the university.

A keen rugby player and member of the Officer Training Corps (OTC), he worked at General Register House in Edinburgh before being commissioned in 1914 as a second lieutenant in the Royal Scots.

He went on to become a lieutenant and a temporary captain before his death in a direct hit from German artillery.

Also featured in the website is George Scott Philp, from Dunfermline in Fife, who was 33 when he died at Gallipoli in May 1915.

He had graduated with an MA in 1904 and was a member of the university battery, a group of artillery volunteers.

Just a few weeks after war broke out, the teacher enlisted in the 4th battalion of the Royal Scots – also known as the Edinburgh Rifles – and rose to become lance-corporal.

The full roll, unveiled as the country marks the centenary of the First World War this weekend, can be viewed at http://straylight.cs.st-andrews.ac.uk/royalscots/