LIEUTENANT FREDERICK LEOPOLD PUSCH, DSO
IRISH GUARDS
27TH JUNE 1916 AGE 20
BURIED: ESSEX FARM CEMETERY, BELGIUM
The bleak inscription on this grave has captured the attention of visitors to the Western Front, several of whom have noted it on the Internet. But no one has so far noticed that Frederick's brother, Ernest John Pusch, was killed just under two months later and has exactly the same inscription. For the parents, Mr and Mrs Emile Pusch, it was "as if the sun had gone out", although for them it IS as if the sun had gone out, not was. Nor is this the end of the story - Mr and Mrs Pusch had three children, one daughter and two sons. Their sons, as we have seen, died in 1916 and their daughter, Helen, died "suddenly" on 30 June 1928.
The boys' inscription is said to have originally been written by Sir Walter Scott on hearing of the death of Lord Byron. There is no evidence for this but Scott did say something very similar in a published eulogy: "we feel almost as if the great luminary of heaven had suddenly disappeared from the sky ... ". I prefer the Pusch's version; its simple, stark language is hard to beat.
Frederick Pusch was studying law in Canada when the war broke out. He served initially with the London Regiment and was awarded the DSO for 'conspicuous gallantry' at Loos on the 25th and 27th September 1915. He is one of only eight junior officers to have received this award during the whole war. He transferred to the Irish Guards and had been with them for less than a week when he was shot by a sniper whilst bandaging a wounded soldier, who had himself been hit by the sniper.
His nineteen-year-old brother, Ernest John, went out to the Front for the first time a few weeks later. He was serving in the 11th Royal Warwickshires, the same regiment as A.A. Milne. Milne recorded a conversation he'd had with Pusch on the way out. Pusch confided in him that his mother had sent him off with a chain mail vest to wear for protection. As Milne reported:
"He was much embarrassed by this parting gift, and though, true to his promise, he was taking it to France with him, he did not know whether he ought to wear it."
Milne felt that Pusch thought it would perhaps be cowardly, unsporting or somehow dishonourable to wear it into battle. However, he never got the opportunity. On the day the Warwickshires arrived at the edge of the battle zone, he was killed by a shell just as he was about to have tea.
Emile Pusch was born in Riga and came to Britain in 1879 when he was 16. He describes himself in the 1901 census as a bank clerk, however, he was in fact no ordinary bank clerk being by 1919 a partner in Lazards. He died in 1939, just after the outbreak of the Second World War. I'd like to finish this tale of family tragedy with a quote from an anonymous correspondent who wrote to The Times after Pusch's death:
"... his chief characteristics were his wide sympathy and kindness of heart, which prompted him to help those in need of assistance. Many young men starting their careers, and others who had fallen on evil days through no fault of their own, owe more to the discriminating and tactful assistance of Emile Pusch than they will ever know. He literally went about doing good; and his memory will live long in the hearts of his many friends."