Black Watch and SAS war veteran
Born: May 24, 1918;
Died: April 30, 2016
JAMES Mackenzie Simpson, who has died aged 97, was a soldier who piped D-Company of his Black Watch battalion into battle at El Alamein, North Africa, a battle which turned the tide of the Second World War.
D-Company took 40 per cent casualties. Of the 5th Battalion Black Watch's six pipers, he was the only one to survive unscathed and make it to the battalion's final North African destination, Sfax in Tunisia. He went on to take part in the invasion of Sicily in July 1943, fighting with D-Company at the key battle for the Sferro hills. There was a time for piping and a time for shooting and the young Simpson fought on the frontline with bayonet fixed on his Lee-Enfield rifle.
Badly-wounded in the leg by shrapnel from a German shell in Sicily, he was taken to Algiers, where, on recovery, he was recruited into the Special Air Service (SAS). His commander was the Scots Colonel William Stirling (Colonel Bill to his men) who had helped his more famous brother Colonel David Stirling found the SAS in 1941.
Back home, Jim Simpson, who is pictured on the right meeting Prince Charles, abandoned his piping, shooting and intelligence skills to work in peacetime for the publishers D C Thompson in his native Dundee. As a senior arts editor, he oversaw the works of 40 artists including Dudley Watkins of Oor Wullie and The Broons fame. Watkins was brilliant but every artist needs a good editor to support them and Jim Simpson did that.
James Mackenzie Simpson, always known as Jim, was born and brought up just off Clepington Road, Dundee, on May 24, 1918. He attended Clepington primary school and Stobswell Boy's Junior Secondary, where he also became a good piper in the Boy's Brigade.
After leaving school, he used his gifts with art to get a job as a commercial artist at Valentines of Dundee, at the time one of the world's biggest producer of picture postcards - from scenic to saucy - later taken over by the American Hallmark group. When the war broke out in September 1939, Mr Simpson joined up with the Black Watch and was quickly promoted to piper for D Company, the 5th Black Watch, part of the 51st Highland Division.
He sailed to Egypt in June 1942 to take part in the North African campaign against Rommel's Afrika Korps and their Italian allies. He was formally kitted out in the kilt - "fully regimental" i.e. no underwear - with the Royal Stewart tartan. To pleat it, he had to hold it over a Primus stove. He always said he would have preferred to wear the Black Watch tartan but, because of the regiment's 18th Century history in America, Black Watch pipers had long since been granted the right (a de facto order) to wear the Royal Stewart.
As it turned out, in the "heat of battle" - and never was that term more appropriate - he piped "the Jocks" in wearing a battledress khaki shirt with HD (Highland Division) and Black Watch patches, khaki shorts and a Tam O'Shanter bonnet with red hackles. Years after the war, many Germans said the pipes, the bonnets and the red hackles were the last thing they saw or heard as they retreated across the sands.
In November, 1942, Mr Simpson, then a Lance-Corporal, helped push the Germans back beyond Benghazi and Tobruk, allowing the Royal Engineers to come forward and clear enemy minefields. In the early months of 1943, he was involved in combat at Buerat, Libya, and Medenine, Tunisia.
On April 6, 1943, he and 5th Black Watch helped take a strategic ridge at Wadi Akarit. To strengthen the resolves of "the Jocks," their target was codenamed Arbroath. Mr Simpson could always say he "liberated Arbroath."
On April 9, ahead of the battalion's Vickers-Armstrong Bren Gun carriers, he piped his company into Sfax, Tunisia, to tumultuous applause from locals who realised the North African was over although the war in Europe was about to begin.
After training in amphibious landings in Djidjeli, Algeria, 5th Black Watch landed near Pachino Point in German-occupied Sicily on July 10, 1943. The war in Europe had begun. Lance-Corporal Simpson helped drive the enemy out of Vizzini before advancing towards the Sferro hills alongside the Gordon Highlanders. The German defenders pounded the Scots with shellfire from the hills and Mr Simpson took a mass of shrapnel in a leg. While his battalion went on to mainland Italy, he found himself in hospital in Algiers where one of his visitors was Colonel Bill Stirling of the SAS. Did he want to get back into the fight? You bet.
Unlike more recent SAS men such as Andy McNab the author, Mr Simpson never spoke of his time with the SAS. No disrespect to Mr McNab who was a courageous soldier before he turned to writing great best-sellers but Jim Simpson stayed loyal to "the regiment." Until the day he died, not even his family knew his rank. All they know, from SAS documents, is that he fought in Italy and in France, getting behind enemy lines to link up with, support and arm the brave men and women of the French resistance. We may never know how important the SAS were in the run-up to, during and after D-Day. Perhaps one day the SAS will reveal his role and he will be honoured accordingly.
After the war, he returned to Valentines of Dundee before joining DC Thomson in 1957, where he would remain until retiring in Broughty Ferry in 1982. As studio manager, he supervised around 40 artists and cartoonists of the most iconic and most-loved characters of the 20th century.
Jim Simpson died in Ninewells Hospital, Dundee, on April 30. His wife Myra (née Cargill) died in 2012. He is survived by his twin children Methven and Janice, grandchildren and great-grandchildren and his nephew Ian Burrell provided much of the information used in this obituary.
PHIL DAVISON
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here