HE WAS THE LIGHT AND LIFE
OF A HAPPY HOME

SECOND LIEUTENANT ALEXANDER BALFOUR HARE

ROYAL FIELD ARTILLERY

31ST OCTOBER 1916 AGE 26

BURIED: CITADEL NEW MILITARY CEMETERY, FRICOURT, FRANCE


This "happy home" consisted of a mother, father, two brothers and a sister who lived in Leith, Midlothian, where Alexander Hare was born. His father, Edward Hare, was a boilermaker, who had been born in Boston in the United States of America, but otherwise the Hare family were firmly Scottish, as was Alexander's mother's family.
A star pupil at Leith Academy, Alexander Hare went on to Edinburgh University where he took a 1st in History and was President of the University Fabian Society. He then taught for a year at George Watson Academy where their records relate that, "In his desire to serve his country he underwent a serious surgical operation, and, having been pronounced fit, was gazetted to the R.F.A."
Hare was killed on 31 October when a high explosive shell hit his dug-out.