BRIGADIER GENERAL FRANCIS AYLMER MAXWELL, VC, CSI, DSO
GENERAL STAFF
21ST SEPTEMBER 1917 AGE 46
BURIED: YPRES RESERVOIR CEMETERY, BELGIUM
On the 11 September 1921 a memorial tablet, paid for by the officers, NCOs and men of the 27th Infantry Brigade, was dedicated in St Giles's Cathedral, Edinburgh to the memory of Brigadier General Francis Aylmer Maxwell, officer commanding the 9th (Scottish)Division, who had been killed by a sniper whilst supervising the action during the Battle of Menin Road.
The inscription on the plaque reads:
Brigadier General
Francis Aylmer Maxwell
VC, CSI, DSO
Killed in action at Ypres 21 September 1917
A gallant soldier and very perfect
Gentleman beloved by all his men.
A tribute from the officers,
NCOs & men 27th Inf. Bde.
9th (Scottish) Division.
General Maxwell's widow quoted from this plaque when the time came for her to chose an inscription for his headstone, just changing one word - Charlotte Maxwell described her husband as an ideal soldier rather than a 'gallant' one.
It's an interesting inscription - "beloved by all his men", how true is this? Maxwell had a reputation as a martinet but when Lieutenant Archibald Gordon MacGregor, using his contemporary diaries, came to write a memoir for his grandchildren in 1968, he could say that Maxwell was universally admired and immensely popular. MacGregor writes:
"Maxwell, 46 years old, was a smallish man of slight build but of tremendous personality, and utterly fearless ... Not infrequently he did not hesitate to challenge or even disobey orders from superiors, if he thought such orders were ill-advised ... Maxwell's death at Ypres in Sept. 1917 was due to a disregard of danger that amounted to foolhardiness. He was killed in no-mans-land after exposing himself to a German sniper who had missed him with his first shot."