Sam becomes a Signaller – and discovers how well his Boy Scout skills fit the military

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Dear all

A hundred years ago… while the big news close to home remained the aftermath of the Lusitania sinking (May 7), ruinous battles continued on the Great War’s many worldwide fronts (including Africa where the South African Army took Windhoek, capital of German South-West Africa, May 12).

    In the east, Russia, Poland and Austria-Hungary clashed at Gorlice-Tarnów (May 1-June 22), Jaroslaw (10-14) and Konary (16-June 23).

    On the Western Front while the Second Battle Of Ypres and the Second Battle Of Artois proceeded (until May 25 and June 18 respectively), General Haig tried something significantly different for the British Army in the Battle of Festubert (15-25). Apparently adopting standard French tactics, he took to “attrition” – preceding a Poor Bloody Infantry advance with an extended artillery bombardment of 60 hours and 100,000 shells. The outcome: 3,000 metres gained when a third of that was anticipated! Casualties: British 16,600, Indian 2,500, Canadian 2,200, and German 5,000…

    At Gallipoli, with failure not countenanced for months to come, the two sides called an armistice to bury their dead (May 11), and in the Helles sector near Krithia the Gurkhas captured Cape Tekeh (12, ergo “Gurkha Bluff”, 60 casualties).

    Meanwhile.... six months on from their enlistment in September, 1914, the 2/1st City Of London Battalion, Royal Fusiliers, including my father, under-age volunteer Private Sam Sutcliffe (still just 16), his older brother Ted (18), and their pals from Edmonton, north London, trained on in Malta with no indication of where they were bound for nor when. …

FOOTSOLDIERSAM SPEAKS

For the last couple of weeks Sam’s been talking about seeing the sites and testing his innocence via a visit to the Red Light District and so on. Now he’s back to barracks – St George’s, in an arid area north of Valletta – and the serious business of developing his military skills.

    This is a significant moment for me as his editor, though not so much for readers I’m sure. Having started his memoir in the third person, calling himself “Tommy”, when Army days began he started venturing into first-person “I” mode, then retreating again – well, this passage is where he finally goes the whole way. He didn’t explain and I don’t know why, though I wonder if it was a matter of seeing the young boy Sam as a separate person he observed in memory, whereas the now-emerging “man” felt like the self he still recognised in his 70s when writing the Memoir…

    He recalls:

‘What were termed “Company orders” would be posted on a board outside the Company office, and the men expected to familiarise themselves with the contents. One such notice I read with great joy: it announced that, now all ranks had completed basic training, a Signals Section would be formed. It invited men having some knowledge of semaphore and Morse Code to volunteer for transfer to the new section. Tests would precede acceptance.

     My name went in pronto, I passed the fairly simple general knowledge and signalling exams, and in no time – though with some regret at leaving my pals and roommates of several weeks – there I was with a new group of lads sharing one of those pleasantly cool barrack rooms fronting on to the roofed and shady sidewalk alongside the Barrack Square. Inevitably, we had much in common; most of us owed our special knowledge to recent or long-past membership of the Boy Scout movement.’

In the May 3 blog (number 43) I pulled in a quote from the childhood section of the Memoir to show how the moral teachings of Sam’s vicar-choirmaster-scoutmaster-music teacher Mr Frusher ensured that he resisted the blandishments of a nice, though probably “professional” Maltese girl. Well, here’s Mr Frusher again – this time as an inadvertent proponent of the Boy Scouts’ role in preparing boys for war.

    This passage occurs just after Sam/”Tommy” left school at 14 because his family couldn’t afford further school education for him:

‘[Frusher] introduced new subjects to the Troop’s training schemes: so Tommy learnt signalling, semaphore and Morse code (the last, he particularly liked). Using flags — one for Morse, two for semaphore — and, at night, signal lamps, they sent messages across fair distances.’

A couple of years later, when he joined up,  Sam/”Tommy” clearly understood the connection between Scout activities and the Army. My father recalls his alter ego thinking:

‘“It’s possible that I’m the youngest in the whole Battalion. But in two or three subjects it’s likely I’m more proficient than many of them: things like shooting, simple drill using semaphore signals with flags, and the Morse Code with flags, lamps and buzzers or tappers — all thanks to old Frusher and the Scouts.”       Tommy never mentioned these matters to his comrades because he knew what their reaction would be: remarks expressing all shades of feeling from amusement to outright derision, depending on the former occupation of the commentator. The “workers” would jeer and the “white-collar boys” would register amusement or toleration for an I-intend-to-improve-myself boy. If of a radical liberal persuasion, they might even express abhorrence for the regimentation of children. One seldom heard outright approval of Scouting expressed, except perhaps by some members of the religious organisations to which the Scout troops were loosely attached.’

But back to the 100-year-old present:

‘The Corporal in charge of the new section, was probably 22 years old, the rest of the chaps between 18 and 20 (not counting me, still 16 until July). He told us we would be spared most of the square-bashing and repetitive drilling which had so far been our lot. On exercises and manoeuvres we would take responsibility for maintaining communications between Company and Battalion Headquarters and, on Brigade exercises, between Battalion and Brigade as well. We thought we were on a soft number at first but, as organisation progressed, demands on us increased.

     Our Corporal Catland had the appearance and manner of a dedicated peacetime soldier; the peak of the cap perseveringly bent downwards and moulded till the eyes were only just visible, the trimmed moustache, the unsmiling face, the smart military gait at all times, on or off duty. We had to find out what brought him among us; no suggestion of the Boy Scout about him. So where had he learnt his signalling? Answer: as a GPO* telegraphist among other things. But the Guardsman-like bearing? From the Boys Brigade** the very antithesis of Baden Powell’s lot. None of us could even begin to look like Corporal Glossyboots, so no warm co-operation twixt us and him ever. Above him was Sergeant Cullen, also, it transpired, a GPO man, but from a higher stratum; he usually remained aloof, relaxed occasionally, and proved himself a damn good teacher.’

* General Post Office: founded 1660 to run the mail nationally, but in the late 19th/early 20th centuries it also took charge of telegraph, telephones and radio.

** Boys’ Brigade: an international and interdenominational Christian youth organisation, founded 1883, it emphasised military discipline and physical exercise plus religion – Baden-Powell actually served as its Vice-President in 1903, then broke away to found the Scouts after his 1907 Brownsea Island experiment.

All the best – FSS

Next week: Meet the Signallers – especially little ladies’ man Peter Miter, the super-patriot with the mighty organ

The Fusiliers in Malta: young Sam drops his long johns – and visits his tailor…

For details of how to buy Sam’s full Memoir in paperback or e-book & new excerpted Gallipoli episode mini-e-book & reader reviews see right-hand column – all proceeds to British Red Cross Memoir now also available at Dulwich Books

For AUDIO excerpts Click Here Join Foot Soldier Sam on Facebook Here

Dear all

A hundred years ago… while pre-Gallipoli sparring continued around the Dardanelles (the Greeks refusing to join the Allies’ side despite the rather presumptuous bribe of an offer of territory around Smyrna), the Turkish Army occupied Urmia (then Persia, April 16), and German zeppelins bombed Tyneside and East Anglia and French airships bombed Freiburg and Strasbourg, on the Western Front the Battle of Ypres was set up when British forces captured the nearby “Hill 60” by tunneling under German trenches and detonating 5,000 pounds of explosive (April 17).

      Down in Malta, though, lodged comfortably enough at St George's Barracks, north of Valletta, my father Private Sam Sutcliffe’s 2/1st City Of London Battalion, Royal Fusiliers, having got over their surprise at not being sent straight to France, the Front, and the horrors they’d heard so much about… followed last week’s outburst of jolly practical jokery by taking the chance to spruce themselves up.

FOOTSOLDIERSAM SPEAKS

A thousand volunteers, including 16-year-old Sam’s brother Ted, 18, and their pals from Edmonton, north London, most of them came from poor families and – unless they’d sailed with the merchant marine – hardly any of them had ever been abroad before. So the heat of spring in the Mediterranean took them by surprise – pleasantly, when they could take their ease in the shade, less so when it came to route marches, square-bashing and other strenuous training exercises wearing their heavy winter uniforms and woolly long johns.

      However, relief was at hand, as my father recalled (NB new readers, in this first part of the Memoir Sam wrote in the third person and called himself “Tommy”):

‘Out of the blue, tropical kits consisting of lightweight, cotton-twill tunic trousers and a sun helmet were handed out. What a relief to get out of the heavy uniforms. Now they could begin to enjoy the Mediterranean climate.

     Some men looked good in the new clobber, others had unluckily drawn clothes that fitted badly. Tommy regarded his baggy, overlong trousers with some dismay. Their length could be concealed by turning up about four inches at the end of each leg – this would not show when he wore puttees*. The baggy backside was the problem and it really worried him so he searched for his brother, thinking he might have learned something from his particularly artful associates.

     Ted, whom he found wearing the old trousers, told Tommy to go and get his heavy ones too. Then he led him to a building within the barracks area. Inside were four Maltese men, two of them busy on sewing machines, one cutting pieces out of tunics and trousers, while the fourth drew white chalk marks on the uniform of a soldier standing before him.

     “Take your place in the queue,” said Ted. Soon after complying, Tommy was getting chalked. “Pay one shilling, come tomorrow,” said the tailor. Tommy left the twill trousers and put on the heavy ones. So, for a bob, the necessary alterations were made – though next day the lad worried anew, because now the trousers were almost skin-tight, the tunic shaped and close-fitting too, and all this done without official permission. Also, was this tight outfit really suitable for a hot climate?

     Too late now, anyway. He regained some degree of comfort by ceasing to wear vest and pants. Many sinners besides himself used the tailors’ services, and perhaps the officers approved the slick effect, for no action was taken about the matter.’

Soon a fierce training regime made the Fusiliers bless the day those tailors found the barracks and a business opportunity:

‘Hours of work now changed. What the Army called the “gunfire ration” – a mug of tea and large dry biscuits – was taken at 6.30am, followed immediately by 30 minutes physical training, wearing only the twill slacks. Then “ablutions”, breakfast – whatever that might turn out to be – and on parade at 8am. Three hours non-stop training next, then dinner at noon, after which those who had no “jankers” or special jobs were free till 5pm.

     Most of them easily acquired the siesta habit, waking for tea at 4pm and all set for three more hours of stiff evening training which left most men fagged out at 8pm.

     Not many ventured far after that hour, Monday to Friday – especially at the end of one of those occasional days when, despite the high temperatures, they’d undertaken a long march lasting some hours (albeit with a 10-minute break every 4 miles, and an hour’s break and a meal after the first three hours). Each man carried a water bottle and a haversack and the contents had to last until evening.

     The heat made these marches very severe tests. Most of the men dispensed with underclothing as soon as they knew what was coming up. Sweat soon darkened their uniforms. Tunics could be taken off during the hour’s rest and they dried off quickly, leaving white patches of salt in strange patterns on the cloth (despite this, Tommy never once entered the barracks laundry for, like many others, each week he gave his soiled clothes to a Maltese woman who washed and pressed everything, no matter what the quantity, for sixpence).

     Back then no one in authority thought of giving the men salt to replace what they sweated out. Tommy suffered fatigue intensely, but his resolve to do no worse than the older men around him prevented him from admitting anything.

     Troubled as he was, he yet felt sorrow for the oldest man among them, dear old ex-journalist Ewart Walker. Never a groan nor a word of complaint from the gallant old man, but the sweat streaming down his face, and eyes bloodshot and strained behind those pince-nez, the legs that wouldn’t straighten up, all told their tale.’

And here’s a striking moment – for me anyway, editing my father’s writings; I realise it’s no particular landmark for a reader. It’s just that suddenly he’s venturing into the greater intimacy of first-person, albeit temporarily for now and “quoting” Tommy as if his teenaged 1915 self were talking to his septuagenarian 1970s self:

‘“By then the Maltese tailors had rendered my sun helmet ready for wear too. Issued with it had been a pugaree**, a length of fine gauze material which you had to arrange in layers just above the helmet brim. To do the job correctly required many pins and more skill than I possessed. But one of my scarce sixpences crossing a Maltese palm put me among the really well-turned-out soldiery. Although we still had to wind those puttees round our ankles and calves. Why, in that hot climate? And it was compulsory for rankers, but officers could wear neatly creased trousers with turn-ups.”’

* For the younger crowd, puttees are strips of cloth British soldiers back then had wind around their legs from ankle to knee for… some reason or other (“support and protection” Wikipedia suggests). The word is one of many co-opted from Hindi by British Army men serving in India and bent a little – the original, patti, means “bandage”. After WWI many other armies followed the British in adopting them. So maybe they made all the difference!

** Pugaree – from Hindi again: pagri meaning “turban” (that comes from Turkish!).

All the best – FSS

Next week: Sam alias Tommy the tourist goes to town, meets the Maltese – and some ancient skeletons…

Sam’s Fusiliers in Malta: the strange case of the boxing glove in the night

For details of how to buy Sam’s full Memoir in paperback or e-book & new excerpted Gallipoli episode mini-e-book & reader reviews see right-hand column – all proceeds to British Red Cross

For AUDIO excerpts Click Here Join Foot Soldier Sam on Facebook Here

Dear all

A hundred years ago… today the First Battle Of Woëvre began (April 5-May 5, in Lorraine) – a French Army attempt to recover ground lost to the German Army the previous autumn and restore rail and road links to Verdun. Beyond the bloody to and fro on the Western Front, down in the Eastern Mediterranean the two warring alliances continued sparring three weeks before the Allies’ strategists threw their neon-lit telegraphed punch and landed at Gallipoli: a section of the Indian Expeditionary Force sailed for the Dardanelles from Egypt (7th); the Allies offered Turkish Smyrna and its hinterland to Greece if they would join in (12th); the French Government assured Russia they recognised its claim to Constantinople (12th – the Ottoman Empire may not have been consulted on that one).

      Meanwhile, the then Great War’s global creep proceeded with the Battle of Shaiba, Mesopotamia (12th, British and Indian forces successfully defending Basra against Ottoman recapture; total casualties about 4,000 men), and a Congo-based Belgian advance on Yaunde, Cameroons, a German colony since 1884 (12th again, busy day).

      Over in Malta, though, lodged comfortably enough at St George's Barracks, north of Valletta, my father Private Sam Sutcliffe’s 2/1st City Of London Battalion, Royal Fusiliers, was feeling lucky. A thousand volunteers, including 16-year-old Sam’s brother Ted, 18, and their two mates from Edmonton, north London, Len Winns and Harold Mellow, hardly any of them had ever been abroad before and here they were settling into this lovely island, sun, sea… when, on the day they’d sailed from Southampton, they’d expected to be manning a Western Front trench within hours.

FOOTSOLDIERSAM SPEAKS

In last week’s excerpt, Sam wrote about his recurring fears that his age would be revealed, resulting in, at best, sending home and separation from his brother (who was his hero too), at worst prosecution and imprisonment for swearing a false oath. But soon he started to feel that even those who regarded him with suspicion had come to accept him. This Fusiliers, as you might guess, expressed their approval by making him the first victim of a spate of practical jokes – at least he gladly took it that way. (NB new readers, in this first part of the Memoir Sam wrote in the third person and called himself “Tommy”.) As my father recalled:

‘It happened one night, after lights out. Some talking went on for a while, followed by comparative silence with the occasional bump, grunt, or snore. Tired Tommy slept… until something he could not identify woke him with pulse racing and a sense of shock, eyes wide open, but the room black dark. He did not yell or speak, just lay there trying to decide what had disturbed him. Smack! Something struck him in the face and he shouted in protest. Responses varied from “What’s up, mate?” to “Go to sleep!” and “Shut up!” So he told them something or someone had hit him. Accused of having bad dreams, he said no more. But when another light blow landed on him, someone laughed.

     Wide enough awake to judge from which part of the room it came, Tommy said nothing, feigned sleep, and for some time all was well. Then the joker struck once more, but the lad grabbed at the offending object and found himself holding what, from the feel of it, he guessed was a boxing glove… attached to a thread. Tommy snapped it with a smart jerk and flung the glove in the direction from which the laughter had come. As this elicited a loud curse and some threats, he lay doggo, feeling he had not come out of the lark too badly.

     Daylight revealed a strong, black thread passing over a bracket supporting the shelf above him and stretching over other brackets to a bed at the end of the row. Private Willis had been the joker, raising and releasing the glove.

     Interested blokes wracked their brains in devising further funny tortures with which to enliven the first hour or so after lights out each night. Grown men these, but in many cases sharing a large dormitory with other males for the first time; they perhaps felt impelled to behave like boys they had read about in The Magnet and The Gem weeklies*.

     One man discovered that the beds could be taken to pieces; so if the legs were detached and re-placed in position so that it looked normal, of course, it collapsed as soon as the occupant sat down on it too forcefully or rolled over in his sleep. One evening, while others lingered in the canteen or perhaps, having avoided detection, sampled the wines in some drink shop down the road, our funny men faked about half the beds. Those who came home first had their crashes and either laughed or cursed as they considered appropriate, Tommy among them. But two or three who returned after lights-out were landed with wrecked beds in pitch darkness, and their boozy efforts to reconstruct them kept the other men amused for some time, until the victims settled for sleeping at floor level.

     No harm done, but the less ebullient of the roommates complained about this childish conduct. A conference next day decided that they’d all had sufficient of these larks and bed-wrecking was out. All settled down quietly that night… until, around midnight, a crash broke their slumbers. Striking of matches revealed three beds with front legs collapsed. Because the back legs hadn’t been tampered with, the beds stood for some time then, a little after lights-out, someone crept about passing a rope round each unsecured leg, then pulled hard. Real anger erupted, and nobody admitted responsibility.

     That was almost the end of comedy japes and men once more became as adults. With one exception, that is. The Orderly Sergeant doing his rounds, rousing men at 6.30 one morning realised just how unpopular he was when someone (well, there must have been two of them) tipped the piss-tub over him from the balcony high above.

     No one confessed so the innocent suffered with the guilty when Captain Boden ordered H Company confined to barracks for several days and had them march up and down the square during the mid-day hours when they would have been resting. Thereafter, Tommy’s comrades lived the high life, if any, outside the barrack room. Within, they just rested or ate their meals. Happy day.’

* The Magnet, a weekly “story book”, ran from 1908 to 1940, carrying the Greyfriars School stories featuring Billy Bunter, written by Frank Richards (real name Charles Hamilton, 1876-1961); The Gem was published from 1907 to 1939, its main story about another public school, St Jim’s, its hero Tom Merry, the author again Hamilton, here nom-de-plumed Martin Clifford; Amalgamated Press published both weeklies and, according to Wikipedia, World War II killed them off, because of paper shortages.

All the best – FSS

Next week: At last the Fusiliers drop their woolly long johns, get tropical gear – and visit their tailors…