NAM.1957-04-1-1

Return of the Fore and Aft, Gloucestershire Regiment advancing to the attack, India North West Frontier, 1897 (c). Oil on canvas, signed lower right ‘E H 97’, by Edward Matthew Hale (1852-1924), 1897. This is an apparently fanciful representation of the Gloucestershire Regiment in action on the North West Frontier of India, 1897. Although the 1st battalion arrived in India in 1897, it seems that the Gloucestershire Regiment saw no fighting between the Crimean War (1854-1856) and the Boer War of 1899. The painting illustrates Kipling’s short story ‘The Drums of the Fore and Aft’, which is centred on a fictional regiment know as "The Fore and Fit Princess Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen-Anspach's Merther-Tydfilshire Own Royal Loyal Light Infantry". That regiment is given the nickname “the Fore and Aft", derived from the nickname of the Gloucestershire Regiment.

India, North West Frontier, Black Mountain Expedition (1897), India, North West Frontier, Mohmand Expedition (1908)