Of all the treasured privileges of British arms, one of the most prized is a 185-year-old battle honor shared by six regiments: the wearing of a rose on Aug. 1. That day is the anniversary of the Battle of Minden in the Seven Years' War, when those infantry regiments, outnumbered, plucked roses in the field on their way to battle and withstood the charge of the French cavalry, despite frightful losses, to carry the day.
Last week from London's War Office came a new story of one of those old regiments. The place: Mont Pinçon, highest tor in Normandy, strongly held by the Germans. The time: four days after Minden Day, 1944. A British battalion had bogged down at a small stream footing the mount. Small groups tried to rush the bridge. Each time they were mowed down. The battalion's lieutenant colonel was 30-year-old John Child Pearson of Blundellsland (near Liverpool), who sported the wide mustache that Sandhurst's young graduates affect. Somewhere he found a rose, and pinned it to his blouse. He stepped out, jauntily swinging his swagger stick, as casually as if he were taking a Sunday stroll in the country. He strode down the middle of the road, his men following, reached the bridge across the little stream and crossed it. There a stream of German steel caught him and he fell dead. His men went on. That night they slept in the stronghold atop Mont Pinçon.
* The Hampshire Regiment, the King's Own Scottish Borderers, the Lancashire Fusiliers, the King's Own Yorkshire Infantry, the Royal Welch Fusiliers, the Suffolk Regiments.