Seasonal Rewind 2 – Sam’s Gallipoli Christmas and New Year… landing at V Beach through the bowels of the River Clyde, getting acquainted with the lovely Asiatic Annie and German planes dropping darts and bombs… but a New Year/evacuation feast offers much consolation – Happy New Year from Cape Helles!

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Dear all

A hundred years ago this week… The war in Europe did no more than smoulder, whether it was the Western Front around Ypres and Verdun, or the Eastern Front where peace negotiations seemed to have gone chaotic with the Russians demanding a move to Stockholm from Brest-Litovsk (Belarussia) and General Kaledin’s “volunteer army” perhaps causing the Bolsheviks more concern than anticipated. Down in Italy the Austrians, ultimately held back after their long attempt to sweep south, took some revenge by bombing Treviso, Vicenza, Castelfranco, Bassano, and Padua (December 31 and January 3-4).

    The more striking events were German successes at sea against British troopships and even hospital ships. The Osmanieh succumbed to a mine off Alexandria (December 31; 198 casualties), and the Rewa, with a 279 wounded/sick officers on board, sailing from Malta to Britain, was torpedoed and sank in the Bristol Channel (January 4; all crew and patients saved bar four engineers killed by the explosion).

[Memoir background: my father, Lance Corporal Signaller Sam Sutcliffe from Edmonton, north London, under-age 2/1st Royal Fusiliers volunteer and Gallipoli veteran (Blogs September 20, 2015, to January 3, 2016), had fought on the Somme Front with his second outfit the Kensingtons (Blogs May 15 to September 25, 2016)… until officialdom spotted his real age – 18 on July 6, 1916, legally too young for the battlefield. So they told him he could take a break from the fighting until he turned 19. He took up the offer, though with an enduring sense of guilt. By December, 1916, he ended up posted to Harrogate, Yorkshire, and re-allocated again, this time to the Essex Regiment 2/7th Battalion. An interesting year ensued – four months of blizzards, a meningitis scare, special training in various northern locations, and then a few summer weeks stomping around Yorkshire on a route march… which in due course led him to hospital again, to recover from lurking effects of trench warfare’s privations – and prepare for more of the same (he was 19 on July 6, 1917, while in hospital). During that period, his Company Officer told him he’d been offered the chance to train as a commissioned officer, but Sam detested ordering men around – especially when death might be the outcome – so he refused; one immediate-post-war pension form suggests this defiance brought about his “reversion” to Private, but it’s not clear. He spent several autumn weeks refreshing his signalling skills at an Army training camp outside Crowborough, Sussex, and, come November/December, enjoyed what turned out to be the final home leave of his military career. Come December/January 1917/8, he’s returned to France with the Western Front coming up once more… However, pro tem the main narrative is subject to a two-week seasonal interruption…]

FOOTSOLDIERSAM SPEAKS

Last week, with no Christmas/New Year story to tell from 1917/18 – because Sam filed it as “forgettable” in the Memoir via the simple device of forgetting it, we returned to his festive season of 1915/16 in and around Gallipoli, a period of a few weeks which really did demand writing about.

    So that story so far, in summary, is the 2/1st Royal Fusiliers evacuated Suvla Bay on the night of December 18-19 and enjoyed a high old time on Lemnos – Sam more than most, because of a surprise reunion there with his older brother Ted – the main event being a massive feast (in nalnourished-men terms) on Christmas Day with normal rations richly reinforced by bonus beer from the Army and parcels from home, the 200-odd Suvla survivors being advised they could devour their absent comrades’ Christmas goodies too.

    However, this proved much too good to last. At 5am Boxing Day their Sergeant roared out that they must all get up and prepare to sail away again. As usual, no one told them where to, much less why, though the sound of gunfire and the black looming of cliffs against the night sky soon put them in the picture…

‘Now we could make out the black shape of a big ship, berthed in the shallows head-on to the shore(3). Moving closer, we saw a large, square opening in her side and, the tide being just right, our shallower ship could tie up to her and we could step across into her innards and eventually emerge on to a sort of landing stage. We hurried along it before gathering, briefly, on the beach beneath towering cliffs… But no enemy fire came our way.

     Excitement and interest now replaced resentment, as we filed some way up a gully and waited. I saw someone approach our Major, who then led us further upwards into this rising gully. A great flash some miles distant seawards gave short illumination to the scene; we saw we were passing a strange, wooden tower… and at that moment, almost unbelievably, from the top of it a hunting horn sounded.

     “Lie down!” yelled an unidentified voice and, being no strangers to this life-saving precaution, we were probably flat on the ground before he was. We heard the usual tearing scream, the crash, and below us – about the spot where we had first paused – we saw a brilliant flash and a large cloud of smoke, followed by the whinings of many flying pieces of shrapnel, the phuts as some of them landed nearby.

     Said the voice who had given us the warning, “That shell was from Asiatic Annie(2), a real big gun across the sea there in Asia Minor. When the lookout up above sees her fire, he blows his horn and we have about 30 seconds to take cover. The shells don’t always land here, of course, but we assume they will.” The informative bloke added that we had landed at V Beach and that the ship we had come through was the River Clyde beached there in the first Gallipoli landings months earlier.

     So at last we knew that a complete evacuation of Gallipoli had not taken place, that we were once more stuck on that ill-starred Turkish peninsula. I recall wondering what brother Ted would think of my second disappearance; he would be mad about not travelling with us, that was certain. Still, although he really belonged to us, he was attached to the Field Hospital for duty; what a surprise he must have had when he found our tents empty.

     We moved steadily upwards along a track which eventually brought us to flat ground at the top of the cliff. Now, away in the distance, we recognised all the audible and visible indications that over there was a battlefront; personally, I felt once more the growing nervous tension, the alertness generated by the desire for self-preservation.

     Even so, through a few days good living and the contact with normal people provided by the letters from home and those lovely parcels, I felt changed and strengthened; I knew this tautness was not, at present, allied to fear, as it sometimes had been when lack of food and sleep had caused debility. I’d had proof the normal world still carried on, albeit with certain difficulties, and that we had not been forgotten or given up for lost.

     We few remaining Signallers stood together talking quietly. Short, sturdy Nieter recalled our days and nights together on that hill(4); I hope I told him how much his faith in the cause and his cheery optimism had helped me when the physical after-effects of the blizzard got me down.’

(2) SS River Clyde: a collier launched in March, 1905, adapted as a landing ship in 1915; that April, she sailed from Mudros to Cape Helles V Beach; bombarded from the cliffs, she was beached to serve as a bridge for landings and then for returning wounded; six of the River Clyde’s crew were awarded VCs; the apparent hulk was later repaired and sold to Spanish owners who used her as a Mediterranean tramp steamer until finally scrapping her in 1966; on April 15, V Beach, only 300 yards long, became one of five main Allied landing places on Cape Helles; it was overlooked by cliffs, a fort and an ancient castle, Sedd el Bahr Kale (Anglo spelling varies), occupied and defended by the Turkish Army, though captured on April 26, during the initial attacks.

(3) According to  an invisionzone page which no longer seems to be available three years on from my original search, Asiatic Annie fired from a place called Tepe, aiming at V Beach (where my father’s Battalion had landed) and W Beach on Cape Helles; https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/history/conflicts/gallipoli-and-anzacs/locations/explore-asian-shore-sites/kumkale says the gun was set up in a 17th-century fort called Kumkalle, five kilometres from the site of ancient Troy.

(4) Old friends from training in Malta for six months earlier that year, they’d lately spent several winter weeks, including the fearsome blizzard after math running a two-man Signals outpost (better described as a hole) on top of a hill overlooking the Turkish lines on 24-hour rotation day after day without relief.

At first it seemed a straightforward Signalling job was required. Sam Peter and two others settled in an eyrie on the cliffside high above the River Clyde - interest added to the experience because the seaward side had no barrier so you could easily roll out and down in your sleep. Fortunately, before any harm befell them, they had to move.

‘Soon, an order came through for us Signallers to disconnect everything, take all the equipment down to a store on the beach, then rejoin our Battalion. A guide took us to where they were living in a series of square holes not far from the beach all connected by a long trench. At last, we learned the reason for our return to Gallipoli; we were to work every night at dismantling and loading stores on to lighters and small ships. Night work only, in order to conceal evacuation preparations. We could take some rest during the day — but, should enemy planes appear, like the occasional small groups of Taubes we’d seen high above Suvla, we must expose ourselves, move around as though busy upon routine matters, and generally try to convince the observers that our numbers were as great as at any previous time.

     Shortly after dawn that first morning back with our crowd, a lone plane did fly back and forth over our area, so we put on our busy act for the pilot’s amusement and information. Quite rightly, acting on instructions, some of our men fired their rifles upwards — imagine our surprise, though, when the pilot dropped a bomb(5). It exploded much too close for our liking and caused a brief interruption to our “busy bee” programme.

     That was the first time I’d thought about the possibility of planes carrying bombs. Probably the pilot hurled it out of his cockpit. Although it could only have been a small one, it made quite an impressive bang. Still, no harm done, so nobody worried too much about air-bomb possibilities.’

(5) Of course, planes dropping bombs had become common in Europe, but down in Gallipoli, in this rather less organised campaign, low priorities and tight budgets presumably restricted innovative approaches.

But soon one of these crudest of aerial bombs “disintegrates” a comrade on the beach in front of Sam‘s eyes – plus they get heavy darts dropped on them, pilots unloading them by the boxfull.

    With their professional specialism – Signalling – redundant, the Signallers now find an unrelated expertise in boozing and noshing called to the colours once more. You wouldn’t want to leave anything for the enemy, would you?

’Our Signals group landed a lovely job which consisted of going to a large dump near the beach and gradually dispersing its contents: canned and bottled food and drink intended as extras for officers – anything that would keep well in cans, boxes, cartons, with smoked items in cotton wraps, also biscuits, some cakes and sweets, wines, beers, but not much in the way of spirits. We loaded these good things on to small mule carts.

     A very fair way had been devised to consign them to the troops in equal quantities. Those up at the Front got the first deliveries, naturally. The officer in charge at the dump had records of all the units in benefit. We could only work at night, but during breaks for rest, or while awaiting transports, we were allowed to eat and drink. Chicken, asparagus, Irish bitter from round brass-coloured tins, Schweppes lemon squash or Seltzer water, thin lunch biscuits and other luxuries…  for a brief period our small, but fortunate group guzzled these lush items.

     Quite fairly, we were not allowed to take anything away from the dump for our own use; but we would be entitled to a share of what was delivered to our Battalion. In fact, we Signallers hadn’t the gall to accept our share when it was offered since we stuffed ourselves to capacity during the night and, in daytime, only wanted to sleep. But we did work with a will on the job — and so shortened its duration, unfortunately.’

The festive season hadn’t been much on their minds since the disruption of their Xmas festivities at 5am, Boxing Day, but suddenly they got a reminder:

‘A few days after our disembarkation at V Beach, around midnight someone called out “It’s New Year’s Eve!” and a special search produced several bottles of what may have been cider, although some called it champagne. We didn’t know which, but heartily toasted each other and anyone else we fancied, before renewing our onslaught on that marvellous giveaway job.’

(6) In fact, six days after they arrived at V Beach.

The evacuation date remained secret, of course. The next order to include the Signallers and other 2/1st comrades really made them wonder what was going on – and put the wind up them, as Sam would say.

‘… a few nights later [so January 3 or 4?], our little group was detailed to join other men and trail off behind a guide in the general direction of the front line. In faint light from a clear sky we could see the nature of the terrain: sometimes fairly level, sometimes hillocks, ridges, low areas. Halting at the entrance to a gully, the leader said, “We now enter Krithea Nullah, which leads to our front line. It gives good cover against rifle and machine-gun fire, but the odd shell can be dangerous; the Turks have got it taped as a route we use regularly, so flop if you hear one coming.”

     We reached what I assumed was the support-line trench where all the men, except lookouts, were dozing. Forward again and the front line was our next stop. There, we were each handed a pick or a shovel and our guide led the way up over the firing step and parapet into No Man’s Land, the space between us and the enemy. He spaced us out in groups of four and told us to start digging holes. The picks made more than enough noise on that hard, peculiar ground and we were sitting ducks for any Turk who cared to take a pot shot. I wished I was still way back helping with the charitable work at the officers’ food dump…

     When several Turk light field guns let fly, their nearness surprised me; a strange feature was the thin, red line visible as each shell left its gun, making me wonder if they used rather antique pieces. Their trajectory was high, its zenith roughly above us, yet the shells – not trench mortar bombs, their whine confirmed – burst only a couple of hundred yards behind us.

     No one told us why, at this stage of the campaign, we poor mugs were digging holes in front of the Turk trenches at great risk to ourselves and our underpants, but even we of the lower orders could guess that we played a part in the great game of bluff. Our top brass hoped John Turk would reason, “They can’t be leaving yet or they wouldn’t be digging works in advanced positions”. I wonder if they were right – if the enemy even cared what we were up to? Perhaps he too had seen enough of the farce. We suffered no casualties.’

The laundry hazards concluded, the Battalion finally got their second set of evacuation instructions – which arrived in Battalion CO Major Nathan’s words, as researched by H Montgomery Ward for his biography Strong For Service, “on the night of Thursday 6th at ten minutes notice [and] in the middle of tea”.

“Once again the quiet line-up in the darkness, the very quiet roll-call, but then the strong, firm voice of our idolised Major saying “Forward!” Little artillery activity as, in two lines, we followed him…

     After we had walked for some time, I saw the dark shape of a large building on our left-hand side. We stopped 30 yards away and I could see that light escaped from several slits in doors or windows. Apart from slight indications of habitation behind enemy lines up Krithea way, this was the first real building I’d seen near V Beach, so I was interested when the voice of one of our best officers informed us that there stood the fort of Sedd el Bahr, possibly dating from Crusade times.

     Cautious no longer, the Major’s voice boomed out, “Corporal Bebb! Corporal Bebb!” It appeared that this popular chap, friend of my brother’s, well known to and admired by me, had taken a small party on an assignment to the front line with orders to return to us in time for our move off, but they were still missing.

     I felt an atmosphere of mystery just then… standing near the ancient fort, Bebb and his little party missing, our contingent now so small that some months before had been nigh a thousand strong, all our senior officers missing, apart from Major Booth; we had successfully crawled away from one battlefront and now we were at it again. Would the Turks let us do it twice?

     Only a few hundred yards to go and our ears told us that the enemy guns were dropping more shells around the beaches than they had done for many a day. Why?

     Hope of Bebb’s party abandoned because we had to follow a precise timetable, our Major said we must now move. As we reached the cutting at the landward end of the beach area Asiatic Annie flashed and one of her huge shells crashed down a couple of hundred yards away, but we walked steadily forward, hoping to be spared. A sad thing it would be if she wiped most of us out when we’d got this far…’

But it proved another brilliant evacuation. Hardly any casualties – much though many of the troops shared the sourness about “doing what we do best - running away”. The 2/1st remnants passed through the River Clyde to board a lighter and then a small steamer…

‘Partridge, probably related to the Robin Redbreast that lifted us from Suvla, chugged off into the night, taking us away from all the nasty bangs and flashes and wounds and deaths which make life on active service so unpleasant for us who would much prefer life in an equable clime with a full belly under a tree with a glass of wine and thou and that sort of thing.

     Enjoying myself, I recall, leaning on the ship’s rail, looking at the dark sea with its occasional streaks and flurries of white foam, I heard a conversation in which one speaker was a nice chap and very good worker named Harry Greengrass, a member of our Pioneer section. Harry and his mates did most of the unpopular jobs. He said to someone unknown to me, “The Padre insisted on doing a short burial service over Lewis’s body. You remember, don’t you? The man who copped that bomb from the plane. We collected as many pieces as we could find and sewed them up in a sack, but as we went to lower it slowly into the grave his legs fell out. That scared me because I was sure I had stitched up the bag properly.”

     I moved away. Poor Lewis. A year earlier, who would have imagined it — in pieces in a sack in a bleak strip of Turkey.’

And so they sailed on to Mudros harbour again. They didn’t go ashore, just waited awhile before moving back to Egypt on a large troopship, the Minneapolis. They were to spend four months there on training and r&r before their turn came around to head for the Western Front and the Somme…

All the best – FSS

Next week: Back to Arras, January, 1918, Sam still a free agent exploring his lodgings in the old Prison, freelancing around as a Signaller while he awaits re-attachment to his 2/7th Essex Battalion - and taking inspiration from the sight of a Guards outfit sprucing themselves up, top to toe, despite it all …

(1) In his 70s, Sam Sutcliffe wrote Nobody Of Any Importance, a Memoir of his life from childhood through Gallipoli, the Somme, Arras 1918 and eight months as a POW to the 1919 Peace parade.

Sam and Somme comrades get caught up in a terrifying “balls-up” in No Man’s Land. But then rest, baths, delousing – and mock battlefield practice for July 1…

For details of how to buy Sam’s full Memoir in paperback or e-book & excerpted Gallipoli & Somme episode mini-e-books & 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 this week… the Battle of Mont Sorrel, near Ypres concluded with Canadian and British forces having regained the ground they lost to a German attack which began on June 2 – but they suffered 8,000 casualties to the Germans’ 5,765 (June 14). No conclusion at Verdun yet, though, not by a long way as the attack/withdraw pattern continued throughout the campaign’s many battle fronts: Thiaumont (12, 14 and 17), Hill 321 (12, 17 and 18), Mort Homme (15 and 17), Caillette Wood (15) and Fermin Wood (18).

    The Russian Army continued to prosper – hard to imagine the Revolution was just around the corner – with the Brusilov Offensive on the Eastern Front, begun on June 4, striding along: during this seven days they took Zaleszczyki (12), Torchin (13), and Czrnowitz (17), and crossed the River Styr (16, all Ukraine). The Germans and Hungarians both counterattacked, but the only major Russian failure was an attack (18) on the western end of the front led by General Evert, General Brusilov’s defence-minded rival.

    Evert’s delays had a wider effect, evidently, giving the Austrians more time to bring up reinforcements from their Strafexpedition invasion of northern Italy which they’d given up on by June 10 when they pulled out half of their troops. So the Austro-Hungarians never achieved their objective – to take Venice – and the Italian Army spent the week recovering ground on the Asiago Plateau, in the Lagarina Valley and Trentino.

    On the periphery of the war, established trends continued with the Russians retaining their massive inroads into Turkey (holding a line around Trebizond), the British occupying Kirman (June 12, Persia) and  further chunks of German East Africa (Alt Langenburg, 13, an island in Lake Victoria, 15) and the British-backed Sharif Hussain fighting the Ottoman Empire for control of Medina and Mecca.

    Meanwhile, my father Lance Corporal Signaller Sam Sutcliffe from Edmonton, north London (still under-age at 17), was settling into the Somme Front, after a fashion, as – unbeknownst to the soldiery – plans and preparations for July 1 developed. After a winter at Suvla Bay, Gallipoli, and three months recovering in Egypt, his 2/1st City Of London Royal Fusiliers (250 survivors out of 1,000) had moved to France in late April. To their chagrin, at Rouen the Army disbanded the Battalion and transferred the remnants to other outfits – Sam to the Kensingtons, about May 14 (which also began a long separation from his brother Ted, 19, another former Fusilier). They soon moved to the Front…

FOOTSOLDIERSAM SPEAKS

Last week, Sam and his comrades made themselves at home in No Man’s Land at night – up to a point certainly, but that was a point where they’d take turns at getting a kip between trench-digging stints. Now between near-peaceful moments in a battered village just behind the trenches, he finds himself again caught amid the sort of deadly chaos you’d expect:

‘Next, we moved to an area in the middle of this town*, further still from the front trenches. Almost peaceful. Our Platoon billeted on the ground floor of a building which had suffered little damage. Completely unfurnished, the windows all gone, but otherwise weatherproof — a roof over our heads, and that was marvellous.

     I had a look around. Outside, the first concrete lampposts I had ever seen lined the main street. They must have carried the then-new carbon, electric lamps which shed a pinkish light and gave faces a brownish tinge. Every lamppost I could see had been hit by one or more shells, exposing thick strands of reinforcing metal within the concrete. Twisted, bent, or knocked sideways, most of them defied total destruction. They fascinated me. So modern, so up-to-date. The French people, I thought, must be way ahead of the British in scientific matters…

     Opposite stood a church, much damaged. Yet a crucifix, about eight feet tall, stood beside it, quite perfect.

     Only troops inhabited this town, I discovered. With one exception: next day a dog waddled into our room and walked around without responding in any way to our calls and caresses. Finally, we decided the poor thing must be deaf and mostly blind, but still it gave us one rather ghostly link with all those people who formerly lived in this country town. Where were they all now?

We still made occasional night journeys into No Man’s Land, gradually developing those forward positions, though not without casualties, of course.

     I recall one disastrous night when my group had to start digging a new portion of trench between two quite well developed stretches on our side. A covering party lay between us and the Germans and we quickly excavated to a depth of about 18 inches. Suddenly we heard shouts and shots from the direction of our protectors.

     Within moments, a rush of fleeing men barged among and between us. So we became the centre of attraction for enemy shells and bullets. I dropped my pick and reached for my rifle, but it was not where I had placed it. Panic froze my belly. To lose one’s bandook** was the crime of crimes.

     “Those bastards!” I thought, and dashed back towards our front trench. Luck favoured me. As I could see by the light from flashes and flares, the first man I encountered was carrying two rifles. I grabbed the one in his left hand, yelled something like “Why the hell… ?!” and “Sorry, mate,” said he, and in a trice I was back out in No Man’s Land with the boys in the trench-building group until somebody gave the order to retreat.

     We made our way back through the wire, only to be questioned by a strange officer as to why we had returned. He happened to be a foreigner and, at that time, we didn’t take kindly to seeing commissioned officers’ uniforms on an outsider. Our resentment showed, but our Company Captain came along in time to stop any further trouble.

     He led us away down a communication trench and when, in the early hours of a fine morning, we finally reached the main street of our deserted town, he ordered us to “Fall in!” Instead of dismissing us, he gave us some rifle drill, just as though we were on a barrack square. “That,” he said, when we were done, “will steady your nerves after tonight’s balls-up.” We understood and, I’m sure, agreed.

     May I state, sadly, that he himself later left us “under a cloud” — it was thought that a bullet wound in one of his hands had been self-inflicted. But, of course, it’s doubtful if anyone thought of helping to steady his nerves when something shattered them.

I revert to the subject of the church on the opposite side of the road. A few days after that “balls-up”, I was having a rest in “our” house when the brief shriek of a big shell preceded an explosion which shook me rigid. Bits and pieces of ceiling and walls fell around me. After the dust settled, I looked through a window-space and saw that the remainder of the church front had collapsed into the road.

     Later, I walked over there. Amid the rubble, the large cross with the figure of Christ stood intact. Near it, I found a small crucifix made of brass and wood, such as a poor Roman Catholic might have on his rosary. I carried that in my tunic pocket throughout the war and kept it with other oddments for many years.

One happy day, it was announced that we had completed our stint in the forward area***. We collected all our gear from our battered billets in the town, rendezvoused in a sunken road, hopefully free from enemy observation, and started marching.

     Soon, all the Companies of the Battalion came together in one long column. The drum and fife band took its place at the head and gave out sweet music. Cares fell away, and we sang and whistled joyfully. Kilometre after kilometre, with occasional ten-minute breaks, we didn’t worry, for this march was taking us in the one direction which pleased all of us – back!

     The Cook Sergeant, as we incorrectly called him, complete with willing helpers and a field-kitchen, had been wafted way back to the pleasant place in which we were to spend a couple of relaxing weeks**** – no lazy weeks, that would have been bad for us. Many convincing excuses for slackness occurred to us, but the MO would have none of them. Strong and healthy himself, he took more interest in the men’s health and hygiene than any other Army officer I ever met. Those responsible for sanitation just had to do a good job or Doc’s keen eye or nose would detect their omissions.

     A substantial hot meal greeted us when we reached our destination. We ate, sitting around in a field near the Nissen huts in which we were to live. But we were forbidden to enter them until we had undergone the great clean-up.

     In controlled groups, we went to a building where we stripped, then ran to shower cubicles and, under the lukewarm water sprays, spent an enjoyable ten minutes, a cleansing treat after several weeks of the mucky life up front. Soon, almost before we’d dried ourselves on the clean towels provided, laundered replacements for the underwear we’d handed in were dished out: two vests, two pairs socks, two shirts, two pairs long pants, two towels – none of them new, but welcome all the same.

     Our own uniforms were returned to us, hot and steaming from the pressure and heat which destroyed the fat lice infesting seams and creases. These little devils only left their hideouts to gorge themselves on our blood – and by the second day of each new stint in the trenches they had always reoccupied their deceased relatives’ former lodgings. They must also have passed diseases***** and, possibly, disfigurements such as warts from one man to another – similar pests spread the plague by way of rats to humans all around the world.

     Thus, in France, the British Army continued to conduct war in a business-like, efficient manner. Somewhere someone may also have been giving thought to winning it and perhaps even ending it. But, in the forward areas, officers concerned themselves only with carrying out orders coming from somewhere way back. To do this, it was necessary to keep as many men as possible alive and fit enough to withstand the shocks and hardships which were their daily lot.

     It was great to be able to sleep undisturbed between the hours of dusk and dawn under the strong elephant-iron of the semi-circular Nissen huts, two warm blankets wrapped around your vest- and long-pants-clad body. Again, they gave us substantial meals. So days spent in rigorous training didn’t come too hard, although our tasks included digging trenches which – a sure antidote to complacency – furnished a replica of the battlefield we would soon be sent to when the Great Day arrived; this included enemy trenches, the lay-out based on photographs supplied by our airmen (in northern France, unlike Suvla Bay, aircraft from both sides were always around).

     After completing the facsimile trench system, we spent hours rehearsing the attack which should carry us through Jerry’s position and, hopefully, through a densely wooded area of open country beyond. I had already seen the wood******. Heavy, prolonged shelling had denuded most of the trees of their branches, but the main mass of tree trunks still provided cover, we were told, for a great many underground forts the Germans had constructed. All this later proved to be only too accurate. What I never have seen mentioned is the probability that German observers took pictures of our mock battlefield and other conspicuously massive preparations which must have shouted our intentions to the German command who would accordingly make their dispositions for that Great Day…

     This wonderful occasion we awaited with mounting apprehension. I was such a windy bugger that, had I been in charge of that Division, I would have insisted on the mock battlefield being camouflaged when not in use, but that only illustrates the difference between a scary little Lance Corporal and a hearty, red-face General.

     If our High Command had thought on similar lines to those worrying – the infantrymen – the attack would have been postponed for a while, some diversions organised in remoter parts of the Front, followed by what would then have been a surprise attack on the Somme. A surprise, that is, to our force as well as Jerry’s. We’d been talking about the damn thing for weeks and the enemy probably knew as much as we did about it.

     Still, good food, hard work, clean bodies and clothes, plus interesting talks given by our MO about keeping ourselves and our environment in good nick, transformed grubby and weary-looking men into tolerably good soldiers. A pity they had to be sent back into hell again.

At this camp, I regularly had letters from home. All was well, they said, particularly as Pa had, through a friend, secured a fairly good job as manager of the export department in a big store – much of the exporting concerned the requirements of military officers in various parts of the world.

     I still hankered after a leave pass, now due to me more than ever I felt. Because Company officers censored all our letters home, when we wrote we had constantly in mind the fact that Lieutenant So-and-So or our Captain would see every word. A rotten arrangement, I felt, but set myself to ignore it; I expressed myself freely when complaining about the wicked dispersal of the remnant of our original volunteer Battalion and about my failure to obtain a few days’ leave. Meanwhile, I wrote with equal frankness, I hope, about the superiority of Army organisation in France over that of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force as I had seen it.

     Called to report to my Company Officer one morning, I received an awful jolt. With obvious pleasure, he told me that I had been promoted to the rank of Corporal. I liked and respected him, a great chap. But how could I pretend to feel the pleasure he obviously expected me to show at this news? I had tried to lie low and lose the stripe which, as I saw it, already disfigured my uniform. I can’t recall how the interview went, but in some craven way I probably concealed my lack of enthusiasm.

     Now I was really worried. Who had recommended me for this unwanted fishbone which could blight all my hopes of pulling some sort of smart stroke to get me a leave pass? I had this constantly in mind and resolved to grasp any opportunity which might assist in getting me off the war-front hook for a few days.’

* Sailly, I deduce from the Kensingtons’ War Diary, but possibly Hébuterne.

** “Bandook”, a Hindi word for “gun”, became British infantry slang through World War I and II. This may well have been the night of June 16 when the WD notes a Kensingtons patrol out in No Man’s Land ran into their German counterparts, lost two men captured, and had to run for their lives.

*** Bearing in mind that my father – who never kept a diary nor took a note – probably remembered events, or at least wrote them in his Memoir, less than chronologically… The Kensingtons’ WD says they marched from Hébuterne to Halloy, the scene of the upcoming Somme battle rehearsals, on June 2 (and then again on June 25). That’s 21.3 kilometres (13 miles), almost due west…

**** Actually six days through to the evening of June 8 when they marched back to Sailly – 450 men having taken the opportunity for a rare bath that morning.

***** Online information suggests my father was wrong about lice spreading any disease – you may know better…

****** Gommecourt Wood and Park, opposite the British front at Hébuterne.

NB: today, and throughout the summer, these blogs will be unusually long, simply because Sam had such vivid memories of, and so much to say about, his experiences a hundred years ago on the Somme. I hope you’ll agree there’s not too much wasted verbiage and plenty of truth and substance.

All the best – FSS

Next week: A week before July 1, Sam witnesses his first flamethrower battle, observes a massive artillery build-up, reluctantly dons his extra stripe, survives another hair-raising experience in No Man’s Land and another cock-up… and comes upon a school still operating within shelling distance of the Front!