More about Robert Jewell Heron

Robert was the brother of Pte Samuel Heron, R/1210, Royal Army Veterinary Corps, who also served during the Great War.

Robert Heron   949   Black Watch

DUNDEE SOLDIER SENDS LOVE TO HIS MOTHER

FROM DEATHBED IN FRENCH HOSPITAL

COMRADES TOUCHING TRIBUTE TO HIS CHUM.

  “He sent his love to you.”

There is a world of pathos in those words, which form the concluding sentence of a letter received by Mrs Heron, 12 Caldrum Street, Dundee, from the colonel in charge of Boulogne Hospital containing the intimation that her son, Private Robert Heron, of the 2nd Black Watch, died there on 24th inst.

Colonel Luther states that Private Heron died at 6.45 p.m. from the effects of a gunshot wound in the abdomen,   “The end came quite peacefully,” adds the officer, “as he did not suffer much pain.  He sent his love to you.”

“The Only Chum I Have Had.”

Private Thos. Tallon, of the Black Watch, furnishes pathetic particulars concerning Private Heron’s fate in a letter to his father, who resides at 65 Main Street, Dundee.

Private Tallon Writes :^___”Just the other day, on the 13th, the only chum I have had since I joined the army seven years and three months ago, and one of the best chaps that any man would wish to chum with, got a bullet in the right side, which came out at the left hip.  I was standing near him when he got it.  I bandaged him up the best way I could until the doctor came.  It was awful to hear his heartrending moans.  The doctor gave him morphia, and put him to sleep for a couple of hours.  He awoke at night before he was to be taken to hospital, and he was quite at ease.  I had a long chat with him before he was removed.  He was in the best of spirits then.  I am just waiting patiently to hear from him, but I doubt if I ever will.  His name is Bob Heron.  He was a fine, good-natured fellow, and one of the neatest and cleanest little soldiers in the company.  That is now a brother killed, and two cousins and my best chum wounded.  The lot of us were in the same section, too.”

The brother and cousins Private Tallon refers to are Privates F. Tallon, Boyle, and Dolan, all of whom have already been reported in the “Courier.”  Private Thos Tallon has now been transferred to the Royal Flying Corps.

The late Private Herron was 28 years of age.  Before enlisting in the Black Watch about eight years ago he was an employee of Forebank Dye works.  He had finished his time in India when war broke out, but went to France with the first draft of the Indian Expeditionary Force.  A brother, Driver Samuel Heron, of the Royal Field Artillery, left for France about a fortnight ago : and the husband of a sister of the deceased soldier—with whom Mrs Heron resides—is Driver James Mair, of the Army Service Corps, who has been at the front from the very beginning of hostilities.

Dundee Courier 29th April 1915