Surname:	Michie
Forename(s):	John Fraser
Rank:	Private
Service number:	2902
Regiment:	1st Highland Cyclist Battalion and Army Cyclist Corps
Date of death:	27 December 1916 Aged 19
Place of death:	Ceres Auxiliary Hospital, Cupar, Fife
Buried Commemorated	Wellshill Cemetery Perth – H. (P2). 34 Kingussie War Memorial and Kingussie and Insh Memorial in Kingussie Parish Church.

Background

John was born on 6 October 1897 in Inverness. At the 1901 Census John is living with his maternal aunt Isabella Fraser in Spey Street, Kingussie. At the 1911 Census John, age 13 was living with his mother and aunt at the Grange, Gynack Road, Kingussie. 

John’s aunt Isabella died in August 1912. In 1914 his mother, Jessie Fraser, Domestic Servant, aged 45 of 12 Commercial Street, Perth, married Peter Dow, Gardener aged 44 of 201 High Street, Perth.

A number of those residents at the Grange, Kingussie in 1911 were boarders who were attending school in Kingussie which was a Higher Grade school offering subjects such as Latin and Greek in addition to French, Mathematics and Sewing.  Bursaries were offered to enable children from the wider highlands and islands to attend.

War Record

John (or Jack) died of pneumonia on 27 December 1916 at Ceres Auxiliary Hospital, Cupar, Fife and is buried at Wellshill Cemetery, Perth.

At the outbreak of the Great War in August 1914 the regimental and territorial cycle corps were officially designated infantry battalions. The first Highland Cyclist Battalion, a territorial force, was embodied in Kirkcaldy. The name was something of a misnomer for Kirkcaldy is hardly Highland territory.

According to some sources the Highland Cyclist Battalion grew out of the 8th Cyclist Battalion of Territorials of the Perthshire Highland volunteers and embodied in 1914 as the 1/1st battalion. In 1915 it was transferred to the Army Cyclist Corps and by July of that year it had moved to St Andrews.