Family :

Education & Career :

Mackenzie went to Wellington College in 1904 with a scholarship, to the Blucher and being made a Prefect, before going up to Trinity College, Oxford again as a scholar, and secured Honours in the Final History School 1912, in which year he took his degree.

He was President of the OUDS and played for the Trinity XI.

He was a member of the Carlton, Cavalry and Caledonian.

Service Life:

Campaigns:

• The First World War 1914-1918, World-wide.

"The Battle of Loos (25 September to 18 October 1915) was the major battle on the Western Front in 1915, surpassing in every respect all that had gone before in terms of numbers of men and materiel committed to battle. The preliminary bombardment was the most violent to date and the battle was charaterised by the committment of Regular and Territorial battalions on a large scale, in which the Territorials performed just as well as the Regulars. As the battles on the Western Front in 1915 increased in size and violence, so the casualties increased in proportion: Neuve Chapelle 12,000, Aubers Ridge/Festubert 29,000 , Loos 60,000. 1916 was to take the casualty cost to another level. Loos was intended as a minor role in support of French efforts around Arras but circumstances reduced the French effort. It marked the first use of poison gas by the British. Once the initial assualt had failed the battle continued in a series of actions mostly focused on the northern sector around the tactically important Hohenzollern Redoubt."

Detail :

On 25th September 1915 the 5/Cameron Highlanders were in the front line trenches for the Battle of Loos.

They were positioned just to the north of the Hohenzollern Redoubt, a formidable German strongpoint south of Auchy. Their first objective was a German trench called Little Willie ? no doubt a reference to the Kaiser! The battle was to start on the morning of 25th September with the first discharge of poison gas by the British. This however did not work to plan as the wind speed and direction changed thus much reducing its impact on the Germans whilst troubling the British troops in their advance.

The gas problem was to cause particular problems for the 5/Cameron Highlanders who had the 7/Seaforth Highlanders on their right who were tasked with a direct assault on the Hohenzollern Redoubt.

The attack was planned for 0630hrs and the Seaforths duly charged off on time and worked their way around the redoubt and made considerable progress through the German communication trenches and some miners cottages to hold a position at Fosse 8, a mine pit head.

The Camerons however decided to wait until 0650hrs in the hope that the gas would move towards the Little Willie, however the gas did not oblige. Therefore when they set off the Germans were already aware and prepared and as they moved towards Little Willie they come under severe enfilade fire from Mad Point another German redoubt to their left.

Despite taking heavy casualties the Camerons were able to quickly take Little Willie as the wire in this sector had been cut by artillery. The 5/Camerons War Diary noted ?It was found that the whole line of advance was enfiladed by heavy machine gun and rifle fire from Mad Point?This fire caused us very heavy losses practically having wiped out the first two lines?. Remaining under heavy fire they moved forward and eventually at about 0710hrs joined up with the 7/Seaforths.

The cost for the 5/Cameron Highlanders was dreadful. Of 800 men who had left the trenches, only 2 officers and 70 men remained.

Kenneth Fitzpatrick MACKENZIE was one of those who were killed.

Masonic :

Source :

The project globally acknowledges the following as sources of information for research across the whole database:

• The Commonwealth War Graves Commission
• The (UK) National Archives
• Ancestry.co.uk - Genealogy, Family Trees & Family History online
• ugle.org.uk - The records of the United Grand Lodge of England including the Library and Museum of Freemasonry

Additional Source:

• Founder Researchers : Paul Masters & Mike McCarthy
• Researcher : Bruce Littley
• Researcher : Tom Hawley